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OUR OPINION
Recently, I was caught in a web of my own making. Quite literally. Not “literally” in that way where people mean “figuratively”, e.g., “I was so bored, I literally died” (did you bring back a dictionary from the afterlife, perchance?). For the sake of authenticity though it wasn’t an actual web, so perhaps I should curb my vernacular snobbery. It was a fly strip. But I’m getting ahead of myself. My otherwise lovable domicile does not have heating or cooling and only one window that opens, which has resulted in the occasional encounter with winged fauna. Thankfully, only one bird has found its way inside and quickly found its way out again. While I have nothing personal against bats and acknowledge their important role in our ecosystem, I confess I have trouble sleeping when they zoom into my room at night and knock around like a drunk spiraling their way to the front door after last call. While my cat Twigs loves to slake her bloodlust on anything with wings, I am not a trauma cleanup technician (at least I’m not willing to be an unpaid one).
A fan in the window going full blast at night seems to have deterred the flying mammals however, so now I only must contend with the winged insects that find their way inside, mostly mosquitos and flies. It’s probably just me, but said flies seem particularly plentiful this year. So much that I have several fly strips placed throughout the apartment, like the world’s laziest entomologist with a singular insect fixation.
Which, for the sake of this story, takes me back to Twigs, my COVID cat, my little insular isolationist and furry serial killer. If she had a motto, it just might be, “If it flies, it dies” or “If it runs, it’s done.” More often than not, she’s a quiet companion. I’ve learned the alarmingly gross way during our time together that when she meows in earnest and continuously, it’s the rough translation of a town crier calling, “Hear ye, hear ye, come forth and see what I have slain for mine honor and the greater good.”
Thankfully, it’s usually nothing that requires cleaning gloves and disinfectant. She finds grasshoppers to be a fine repast. Sometimes, she brings them inside seemingly thinking the rest of us need to bear witness to her Caelifera carnage, toying with them until she decides she’s played with her food long enough.
Not a fan of bearing witness to dismemberment, I will try to catch them (much to her chagrin) and toss them back outside. Last Saturday I was in the kitchen making Agua fresca to beat the heat when she sauntered by with an especially large specimen squirming in her maw. I immediately left what I was doing and commanded her to “drop it,” to which she did not heed because she’s not a dog, and adheres to the feline creed of, “Hag, don’t tell me how to live my life.” She communicated this by narrowing her eyes and picking up the pace in the direction opposite me. I let my irritation get the best of me and hurried after her, my orders falling on deaf, pointy ears. In my desperation not to have to clean up bug parts, I temporarily forgot my surroundings and ran straight into a fly strip dangling in the entryway to the kitchen. Not manufactured to handle such robust quarry, the tack holding the strip in place came loose, causing it to drop onto my head and wrap around my hair and neck. To point out the obvious, panicking doesn’t help in any situation, and this was no different. Common sense managed to win, and I immediately stopped my flailing, sending up a silent prayer of gratitude that this was a fresh fly strip, so at least I wasn’t basted in rosin and bug bodies.
How do you remove a death ribbon from your hair? Very carefully. Aftercare included an unscheduled grape seed oil treatment to the scalp to remove the stickiness and a thorough shower.
Twigs got her nosh, though.
SOPHIA MATTICE-ALDOUS IS A MURROW NEWS FELLOW WORKING DIRECTLY WITH NEWSROOMS AT THE NEWPORT MINER AND RANGE MEDIA THROUGH A PROGRAM ADMINISTERED BY WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY. HER REPORTING IS AVAILABLE FOR USE VIA CREATIVE COMMONS WITH CREDIT.
