jodyrathgeb

  • Home
  • About us
  • Writing
  • Mosaic Gallery
  • Photos: Island-inspired
  • Photos: Places near and far
  • Blog Archive

Creepy-crawlies

6/27/2013

2 Comments

 
    It is weeding season, which means I'm spending lots of time with my face close to the dirt. So of course I'm noticing and thinking about creepy-crawlies.
    I've had a long and complicated relationship with insects and spiders, and I'm sure I'm not the only person who collectively calls them all "bugs." As a child, I was a screamer for just about everything. The boys next door knew they could freak me out with a harmless daddy-long-legs, and I believe neighbors were ready to call the ambulance when they heard my reactions to a tentworm falling into my hair.
    In partial defense, I was influenced by my mother and older sister in this. In addition to the screech, we shared a gesture meaning "ewwww!": hands held up beside the head, shaking rapidly. I once heard furious banging in the bathroom and investigated to find Susan pounding the tub with a slipper, killing what she thought was a centipede. Then she put on her glasses, and it turned out to be a clump of hair.
    Such reactions continued into adulthood, until they were moderated by three experiences: volunteering at a zoo, teaching at a nature camp for youngsters, and living in the islands.
    ZooAmerica started by making me comfortable with snakes, and as I continued to interact with the naturalists and animals I became okay with touching a tarantula's exoskeleton and feeding mealworms to baby alligators.
    Under Rockwood Park's nature camps' no-kill policy, I carefully picked up ants to move them outdoors, caught toads to let the kids see them up close and let caterpillars walk on my arms.
    On North Caicos, I learned that open houses bring in all sorts of guests that must be dealt with: spiders as big as Buicks, "bat" moths, geckos and huge cockroaches. I still scream a lot, especially for the roaches, but then I gather my courage.
    What happens next depends on what critter is there. Here, loosely, is my schema.
    NEVER KILL: Geckos and lizards (which eat the things I don't like), ladybugs, fireflies, snakes, frogs, butterflies and moths, dragon- and damselflies, bees, caterpillars and most spiders. I won't touch a worm, but I won't kill it, either.
    ALWAYS KILL: Roaches, mosquitos, flies, stinging ants and anything in my bathtub.
    SITUATIONAL ETHICS: Ants are okay outdoors where they belong; they don't belong in my kitchen, so die! And although I know Buick spiders and millipedes are harmless, they give me the willies. Outside, okay; inside, an apology before death.
    Is this "ranking" of creepy-crawlies fair? I wonder. On North Caicos, I have a Buddhist/animist friend. Does he affirm the mosquito's life by not slapping it? In short, WWND? What would Naqqi do?
    I'm hoping to get a comment from him.
2 Comments
Naqqi
6/27/2013 10:14:02 am

I reason that once a mosquito has, or will have, my blood in it, it is part of me, so I can get rid of it like I was ptooeying away a bitten fingernail. Of course, I don't dispatch mosquitoes like that but you get the idea. Ants also get bombarded -- vinegar, diatomaceous earth, shelltox, whatever I have -- because they otherwise begin eating me at night (we have a HUGE ant problem in Kew, and I've swept a quart and a half of dead ants out of my house in one day before). I'm not much for fundamentalism in any belief system. I'm satisfied having slightly more compunction than the ants or mosquitoes too.

Reply
LRae
7/1/2013 11:24:24 am

A friend of mine, always asked, " Is it a good bug, or bad?" before she took it's life.
If it was the good bug, and lived then the question, why?
"If it does not bite, or eat me,or my pets, or my plants.
It can live."
After awhile she stopped asking.
She would make a funny noise, and I took matters into my own hands.
No one likes crawly things they no little about, and they do like to surprise us, yuk or yikkes.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    RSS Feed

    Author

    This blog by Jody Rathgeb existed, on and off, from 2012 to 2020, changing focus  several times over the years. Its last iteration, with a focus on island living, was also posted on Facebook as Beyond the Parrot Paradise.

Proudly powered by Weebly