Bugs



So far for me the biggest surprise of motherhood has been all the bugs.

I spent a lifetime avoiding bugs. Others may claim that my constant string of steady boyfriends from the ages of 18 - 25 was a deep seated fear of being alone or an inability to embrace independence or something like that. Nope. I just wanted someone around to kill the bugs. I hated bugs. I was afraid of bugs.

Now? Now, my life revolves around bugs. Honestly, we spend most of our time catching bugs. Last night, a full 30 minutes was devoted to running outside and catching lightning bugs in our hands. Our bare hands.

If we find a spider in the house, I am not allowed to kill it. "Spiders are helpful, Mama," I'm told. We gently release it into the outside. (except when the kids are in bed.....then I squish the damn things. shhh...don't tell...)

Now - now I am growing bugs in my basement.

Dana is turning caterpillars into butterflies:



Doug's mom sent her a kit. We sent away for our caterpillars and they arrived within days. Tiny little things. In a jar. They ate and ate and ate and grew and grew and grew. Then, they all climbed to the top of the jar and attached themselves to the paper and formed chrysalises. (Is that the correct plural? who knows?)

Lucky me - I got to transfer the things from the jar to the net. Two of them didn't make it and fell on the floor. The rest are still hanging from the paper which I taped to the side of the net. We must have cheap tape because I have to re-hang them every morning.

You don't even want to know the amount of time we spend watching our caterpillar chrysalises. Sometimes they wiggle. They wiggled a bit while I transfered them.

Evidently, the ugly scrawny caterpillars we got in the mail will be transformed into beautiful butterflies by the end of the week. And even I have to admit that this is a little bit cool. (Shh...don't tell...I have a reputation as a bug-hater to uphold here.)

Posted: Sun - July 2, 2006 at 10:01 AM          

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