Know What Bugs Me? Insect Demise

What bugs me is the way many insects meet their end. Think of the baby grasshoppers that get in the way when mowing a field. I don’t want to kill them, but with grass over a foot high and a zillion of them popping up in front of me like so many kernels of popcorn, I can’t help running over the ones in my path.

I wonder if they’re scurrying, calling to each other, “Man is in the fields,” as Bambi’s mother warned him of man in the woods.

Then there are the earthworms I uncover while I’m turning the soil for my garden. Why don’t they crawl a few inches to a cool spot in the moist earth? Are they super lazy, or can they not find their way back in?

If I put a clod of dirt over them, would they return to life as usual? I doubt it. They seem determined to lay in the sun and die.

 As for mosquitoes with their pesky buzzing sound, I don’t care much what happens to them.  In fact, the more the bats hunt and eat every night, the fewer bites for me.

But what about the occasional water bugs that make their way into in the basement in fall? They look similar to roaches but are slow-moving, never come up in the house, and don’t do much of anything as far as I can tell.

Before long, ready for life’s end, they turn on their backs and wiggle their legs as if to hasten death. If you turn them over, they’ll crawl away and do the same thing again.

Crickets come in the basement in fall too. Again, I don’t see the harm in them, so I let them go on about their business, but if they venture upstairs, Rocky and Sapphire, our cats, have a game in mind the crickets won’t like. When I find the cats with one, I scoop the tortured thing up and flush it down the toilet, hoping it will be a quicker death.

Life is brief and harsh for insects, but what can I do about it? If I prayed for the baby grasshoppers to hurry out of the field before I mow, the birds would be waiting. If I stopped to plant each earthworm back in the ground, I’d never get done planting my flowers.

Mosquitos, well, if the Good Lord wanted to do away with them, I’d be fine with that.

I don’t know what can be done for the poor little water bugs and crickets. I guess, like humans, they take a chance at life and hope that when the end comes, it’s peaceful.

We all have a life cycle, and heaven knows people can meet with violent deaths too. But I’m thankful I don’t have to pass away beneath a mower or swelter in the hot sun.

Or get swallowed whole by a monstrous animal.

Maybe we can take a lesson from the insects; get outside more, spread our wings and fly, hide from evil and be ready when our final day arrives.

Linda Sawyer is the author of Blessings Unexpected, a novel. She also writes essays, flash fiction and travel pieces.