The Bug

We used to call Garrett The Bug. Still do sometimes. But that isn't what this post is about.

See, I don't know why I ever thought I'd have a daughter.

Today, as I entered the house from the garage I noticed a bug on the handle of our snow shovel. I sent The Rock Star to grab his "bug catching" net. Together we captured the creature and deposited it into the dead snake's old cage. I thought it would be fun educational to observe a praying mantis for awhile.

I asked The Rock Star what we should call it and he gave me his standard answer, "Cheesy." It's true. Without any parental prompting, he'd name everything Cheesy. I don't know where he gets this love for cheese. Certainly his father and I would never desire to sit down and eat an entire block of cheese. We definitely don't like cheese in just about any form. We don't view cheese as one of the most perfect creations...

In any event, I encouraged him to choose something else. Something, maybe, from the Bible, since this is a pious insect. "How about Jesus?" he asked. But it seemed wrong to refer to a bug as Jesus so I asked him to head back to the drawing board. "Moses!" He smiled.

"Moses is a good name for a praying mantis." I told him. Unfortunately, after further research, I'm about 99% sure that our particular mantis is a female. I think we're just going to have a girl named Moses. And why is it that the first thing we ever have around here that's a chick also happens to be a winged insect?

So we spent some time gathering sticks and such from our backyard to make Moses a little more comfortable. We also searched high and low for bugs but only succeeded in finding a roly-poly and two earwigs. Our resident mantis seemed completely uninterested. The Husband had a meeting this morning so I asked him to bring home some crickets.

Let me tell you. Those crickets were, apparently, like fine dining for Moses because she really went to town on them. Is still going to town on them. Is ripping off their heads with gusto and slurping out their insides. And The Rock Star and I are watching. Observing. Learning about nature. Moses is watching us with those eyes and I'd be lying if I didn't feel like, maybe, tonight I should sleep with one of mine open.

And I'm wondering why I ever thought I might have a daughter. Because, yeah, I can get dressed up and have a tea party and play Barbies with the best of them but I can also catch snakes and watch praying mantises rip the heads off of crickets. There's one thing I know for sure. God gave me boys for a reason. So we'll watch this mantis for awhile. Then we'll either keep her until she dies early into the fall season or we'll let her go. Either way their will probably be tears. So I'll use my estrogen and hold my little man tight. You see, aside from setting up bug habitats, I'm also good at hugs.