going for a walk....

Yesterday, Monday, was a day with literally nothing written on my calendar. That's remarkably unusual. I had sort of expected to get a call to come in to work, to replace my cohort in the floral department, who I knew was planning a long weekend. He had told me he was taking an extra day off this week, and would be away Sun., Mon. and Tuesday. So I had hoped to get a call for a fill-in... but I puttered around in my pj's most of the day.

Should have been doing something semi-productive in the yard, but spent nearly the whole day in the house. I did eventually get dressed, only because I went to run a couple of errands. And due to the fact that I make such fun of people who go out in public in their flannel pajamas, I did not have the nerve to do that myself.


Late in the day, I decided to go for a walk. My usual route is to head north, make a loop into a subdivision, where I will walk to the end of a short street, loop around the cul-de-sac and back out to the street, onto the end, then home again. Totaling about two miles.  Not really a strenuous trek, but a couple of hills that are pretty steep, good heart exercise.

I was, oddly enough, pondering as I walked along, about what a rarity lightening bugs are these days. I think primarily due to municipalities feeling the pressure from citizens to spray for mosquitoes in the warmer months, with the unwanted side effects of: us breathing that poisonous stuff, as well as killing lots of other insects that are not pests. Thus, declining lightening bug population.

But then: Holy Cow! Fireflies!  I got down to the very end of the street, where it is blocked off. Having been barricaded years ago, when a four lane highway, Alt. 27, was widened and cut the street we live on in half. With two dead ends. There in a grassy area, where power lines run overhead, was a huge display of boy bugs, looking for girl friends. Literally dozens and dozens, as it was just getting dark,  rising up out of the grass, blink-blinking. Sending out the signal that they were hoping for an opportunity to reproduce. Dozen and dozens of them in the dusk, Morse-coding their optimism, hoping for spouses.

I thought of what a remarkable thing it was when I was a kid, growing up in a small town, running loose through the neighborhood in the summer. Asking for a jar with a lid so I could go out in the dusky evening and catch the bugs in a jar. It was just the chase that was grand. I am pretty sure the insects were all freed before bed time - but somehow a delightful challenge to run about hoping for a jar full. And before the era of street lights. Not like now, when neighborhoods never get completely dark due to security lights that shine all night. A wonder we did not knock ourselves all silly charging through the pine trees at full tilt, looking at the bugs instead of where we were going.

Just to be sure that experience last night was not an anomaly, I will go again in a bit, when it is nearly dark. Not taking a jar, just hoping to see them gradually rising up out of the grasses where they have been resting all day, waiting for the chance to signal their desire. Looking like something that only happens in the movies when the special effects are so amazing you forget to pay attention to the plot.