I went into the kitchen after work the other day to grab myself a bite to eat. Looking over at the window, I saw three or four black dots crawling over the window. Moving in for a closer look, I then saw that the dots were actually ladybugs (Marienkäfer). And my heart was like, "Awwww...ladybugs...cute" or whatever. It wasn't long before I noticed that it wasn't merely three or four ladybugs, but a swarm of them congregating in the upper right corner of the window frame. Easily multiple dozens of them.
I had forgotten that this happened once the weather dropped. The same thing occurred last fall/winter and it freaked me out. There were just so many of them.
In my mind, I immediately thought of my niece Gabi. She's 10 years old now and I really don't know what she likes anymore, but back in the day, whenever she saw a ladybug, she would kind of flip out. Her reaction wasn't fear, but rather like she was almost emotionally overtaken by the sheer beauty of the tiny insect. From my perspective, the child was way too excited about ladybugs...
But standing there in my kitchen, I wondered about how she would react to a pile of like 60 or 70 ladybugs just crawling around. Granted, it's definitely not the same reaction that you'd have to 60 or 70 cockroaches or spiders just chilling in your kitchen -- but to me, it was really unsettling to see that many ladybugs in one spot. Maybe it was the result of a mistrust spawning from the knowledge of one too many horror movie plots -- e.g. a multitude of anything = attack of the killer (insert noun here). And although ladybugs seem pretty harmless, so do sheep and bunnies...movies have taught me to be on the look out for such anomalies.
I think ladybugs are cute, but even things that are individually cute and unimposing can be scary and overwhelming in large numbers.
Case in point: My family.
All of my siblings are in this picture with (some) of their significant others and kids. There are a couple of my aunts with their families (some cousins and their kids), my grandmother (mother's side) and my mother are all up in there (extra credit if you know who is who -- unless you're actually related to me and then there is no extra credit at all...cheater)
This isn't even really the "extended version" of my family. All lovely individuals, but that's like damn near 30 people in this picture alone.
Feel me?
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