This will be the only written confession I ever make.
I… have a moth problem.
Blame is a very easy to place upon others, so I will be the one to shoulder the weight of it this time. To clarify, the moth problem is not a matter of who facilitated the issue. Rather it is a problem of who is to blame for the beginning of it. Particularly, blame for the person who did not close the front door of our adorable mobile home; A place that, coincidentally, overlooks the favorite gathering place of many insects in the tri-state area.
To make a very short story even shorter, a moth came in through said front door, and immediately decided to lay eggs somewhere in my bedroom, of all places to give birth. In this matter, I would go as far as to say that this moth was a particularly bad mother. What kind of parent randomly enters the home of a perfectly happy family to drop fifteen children on an unsuspecting teenager? What kind of parent, on top of dropping their children on a complete stranger, would think that promptly dying in a bathroom sink is any way to act in front of their newborn children?
As you probably suspect, I am the unsuspecting teenager in this story. There I was; Gently cradling the body of a dead moth-er as her children started to find their way out of their egg casings and into the wide world. They did not seem to need anything, but they were quite a nuisance, so I did my best to kill as many of them as possible (because I am a fantastic surrogate parent). Doing so, however, was quite the Herculean task. In size, these particular bugs were only about four centimeters across, and when it comes to timely insect execution, clapping them out of the air seemed as if it would be quite effective.
Unfortunately, this is when the children had scattered to their hiding places. My refusal to be thwarted brought me to kill them when they presented themselves, but physics, my old nemesis, decided to rear It’s ugly head. No matter the force of my clapping, the air wave created by my hands would sweep the moth children out of harms way. After many days, and many, many claps, the children of moth continued to elude me. This is when I realized that I had a new problem. For every moth that happened to be successfully killed, there were at least two more to take It’s place.
Considering that all of the moths were descended from the same mother, this had troubling implications.
This particular turn of events meant that the children of moth were unstoppable.
As clapping had not yet resolved the issue, I came up with the idea that moth problems need moth solutions. From a chemistry perspective, this mindset very well could have been disastrous for past me. Ever pedantic past me could have applied their many talents to mix water with successfully-clapped moth remains for a real moth solution. When applied to my bedroom, this solution would have provided multiple walls, a desk, many books, and a piano among other things with tantalizing moth water. In other words, this would not be a solution at all (though I did consider it. Who can say what truly goes through my mind in these moments). In hindsight, I am quite pleased that I discovered that air, not water, was the proper solution.
And thus, the vacuum cleaner was invented. The look of surprise on the face of an insect is not a sight that will ever be seen by a human being, but I imagined it as I stood in my bedroom doorway with the vacuum. Many moths continued with their important daily affairs, such as flying aimlessly around the room, when I plugged in my weapon of mass destruction and removed the hose attachment from the body of the unit. Moths were invaders upon my domain, and I was the violent hand of justice.
The process of removing this awful and formidable enemy was not particularly exciting. I think now, though, that if I saw God brandishing a hoover and sucking jets out of the sky, I would have thought much differently. I might have even enjoyed the process that much more. As the bible says we are trespassers in God’s territory, they were all trespassers in my territory, and I give no floods as a warning.
I spent much of the afternoon sucking the little bastards out of the (impeccably decorated) landscape. Despite my best effort, some of the children of moth escaped their rightful retribution. It is all too likely that they have found a secret place; a sanctuary that is hidden from my sight. The threat of death does not keep all of them hidden, however. On some days, a single moth is foolish enough to show themselves. Moth legends says that on these days, these brave creatures are struck down by a single giant. One who shows no remorse for their crimes against moth-kind. At least that is what they would say if moths could have legends.
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