By Elizabeth Bishop Later | Andrew Gide said, “It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.”
This, friends, is the motto of the Lovebug.
Because we do hate them. We really, really do. The level of scorn we hold for these tiny insects is profound on a level that is only reserved for my Aunt Alma’s disdain for Ulysses S. Grant.
And why? After all, it’s just two little bugs.
Mating.
In public.
Which is pretty scandalous, when I think of it and, I suppose, could be a factor related to our bad attitudes about them.
Because I remember vividly the moment when, as a pre-teen, I suddenly came to an understanding of what these bugs were actually up to. I was so incredibly embarrassed by it that I stayed mortified the entire month of September for years.
Even now they make me blush a little.
So if our assessment of these little bugs were only based on the fact that they don’t bite, they only show up for one month out of the year (unlike no-see-ums and mosquitoes), and they really are quite benign, it would be hard to understand our disdain.
Except for one thing.
Lovebugs everywhere
There are, approximately, 40,389,916,300,000 of them per square foot.
In other words, they are EVERYWHERE. Crawling around in stuff. Flying into the house. Landing in our hair. Climbing the window screens.
And, perhaps worst of all, they are so caught up in their amorous activities that they fail to see any vehicle coming their way so there are hundreds of dead lovers splattered on the front of everyone’s cars.
As if their general obnoxiousness wasn’t enough, now we have to witness the demise of Romeo and Juliet over and over and over……
And when they splatter they morph into some kind of strange mixture of Gorilla Glue and cement. Apparently, their body chemistries are acidic (pH of 6.5 for you scientific types….) making it impossible to just wash them off.
Car washes are having a heyday right now.
Interestingly enough, there is an urban legend that holds that the Lovebug is the result of an experiment gone wrong at the University of Florida. As the story goes, scientists were attempting to manipulate the DNA of mosquitoes in order to control the population, and accidentally created one of the most annoying creatures on earth.
This urban legend is just that – a myth – and has never been proven. But I’ll continue rooting for Clemson, just in case.
I was going to start waxing poetic about the ability of the Lovebug to teach us about connection – after all, their entire existence is made up of love and making baby Lovebugs and, surely, there’s something we can learn from every one of God’s creatures.
And I was pretty close to figuring that out until I learned that, after mating, the male Lovebug dies and the female carries it around with her for days until she dies too.
Good heavenly days.
Thanks, University of Florida.
