The Innocence of Insects
An Essay by Jenn Longbine
The summer transitions into an early autumn, the sun dimming earlier in the evening, and the leaves shifting from green to a mottled brown. The Kansas wind isn’t strong, but it provides a cool breeze that is a reprieve from the heat. Not the same flesh-melting heat as the previous weeks, but just warm enough for a breathable blouse and flip-flops.
It is quiet on my street, the distant sounds of children running through the grass and dogs barking the only noises I hear apart from the occasional car driving by. The sky above is a pale blue, and as my eyes graze down the horizon, it gradates to white, to pink, to yellow. The setting sun silhouettes the swaying trees, dancing to a melody only they can hear. The rustle of leaves is like a whispered conversation between them, and I find myself wondering what they are saying. What secrets do they hold?
When I was as child, we’d go camping in the Rocky Mountains. It was cooler in the elevation, but that didn’t stop us from pretending that the large, protruding rocks were castles. We’d each find a structure, declaring our kingdom and establishing our rule. We built houses of moss and twigs for the fairies and left them silver as an offering. We never saw the fairies, but we somehow knew that they were there, relaxing in our mossy houses. They were pleased with us.
Those times of simplicity and innocence are now long gone, but when I sit here and watch the swaying trees and dancing branches, I am reminded of the magical days in the mountains. It’s amazing how fear evaporates while there. At home, the ideas of bugs crawling on my skin makes me retreat into the house. The idea of bears sends shivers down my spine. But there it was natural. We were in their world, after all, just passing through. Somehow, none of that was on my mind as we slept in a dark forest with nothing but waterproof cloth to protect us.
What is it about forces that we cannot control that frightens us? Tornados, predators, floods, hurricanes. They are elements of nature. My beautiful home that guards and protects me is a modern wonder that I will always be grateful for, but it is not natural. I appreciate the safety it provides, but nature was here before I was. Before my house was.
And yet, I continually grow annoyed when I find an insect inside my home. They don’t belong here, I tell myself. But don’t they? Insects do not conform to human decorum and courtesies. They are not vampires – they do not need an invitation.
I do not relish in smashing the insects in my house. Not even the ants that return every spring to terrorize my cabinets and every bag of chips that is unintentionally left open. But yet, I declare war when they cross the boundary into my home. I consider my home by invitation only, but the moths do not understand this. They flit in the open door, drawn to the light for some uncontrollable reason I cannot understand.
It reminds me of the aliens from Toy Story. “The Claw has chosen! I move on to a better place!” It’s all magnetic, and I think perhaps it is their light at the end of the tunnel. With the dawn, they die. Poetic or morbid, I can’t be sure. But I know I will find it another day, wings curled around it’s furry body under a chair or behind a bookcase.
A soft spot in my heart belongs to rollie pollies. I am not sure what they are called in other parts of the world, but they are the bugs that roll into a ball when you touch them. Mini armadillos with a thousand little legs. As a child, they were my friends. I’d collect them like they were Pokémon: I would build little houses and habitats for them and give them families.
I can’t be mad at them for entering my house. Everyone and everything want to be warm and comfortable, especially when winter comes. I wonder how many bugs are crawling under my couch, how many spiders are camping out in my basement.
I’ve graduated from imaginary castles in the mountains to establishing my kingdom and my rule in my own house. Only in the mountains, insects were welcome, expected. Establishing my dominance here is asserted in the guise of safety and sanitation. I convince myself that all bugs are dirty and dangerous. They belong outside in the uncivilized earth. There is a barrier between us: my side and their side.
I convince myself to be so afraid and disgusted that I cannot hear the tune the cricket
s fiddle on their backs. I do not see the twinkling lights of the fireflies mimicking the stars overhead.
As a child, it was all a wonder. A magic that my eyes couldn’t help seeing, and that my mind couldn’t help but romanticize. I would touch insects with my bare hands, let them crawl along my palm. We don’t inherently fear insects. It is a lesson taught, and sometimes a lesson learned.
A couple of years ago, my niece requested a bug habitat for her birthday. I remember the days of craving simplicity, of catching earthworms and keeping them as pets, burying them in the backyard when they died with a little tombstone and memorial service. My siblings and I would catch salamanders by the creek and secretly keep them in our rooms until our mom found them. I wonder now if my niece would request the same thing for her birthday this year, or if she has moved on, grown up, as I have.
I will never regain this wonder, but now I watch my young son collecting rollie pollies and watching the cicadas emerge from their skins. He draws roads for beetles with chalk along the sidewalk, and chases butterflies. It is unlikely that you will ever find me playing with insects, but I hope against hope that my son will continue. His excitement at seeing a beetle merely walking across the grass is a slice of innocence that in enviable.
Someday he will quit watching bugs. Someday his innocence will be lost to video games and girlfriends. Someday he will grow up and not think twice about walking past an ant carrying a chunk of food back to his colony. But for now his innocence is of the insects, and someday he will remember the magic he had lost.
My name is Jen Longbine. I have published several short stories and poems in Fort Hays State University's literary journal, Lines, as well as their journal, Post Parade. I am a novelist at heart, but like to write essays and poems periodically.