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Ode to a Silkworm

Small eggs so black and fine
Unbend and crawl and dine
But not on everything
Even if it's green
One treat alone will please
Leaves! Mulberry leaves!
Soft and fine and new
But shake off all the dew
A connoiseur can drown
While chomping through and down
We may die anyway
If leaves are hard as hay
And leave you wondering
Why did I start this thing? 

It's true. The silkworms are no more. We tried everything. I even steamed mulberry leaves - like steaming veggies for older people with wonky digestive systems. No go. They died. The silkworms, that is. Every last one. Fortunately, the company I ordered them from is sending us a fresh batch and artificial silkworm food. Hopefully this will work.

Oh, the things fiction doesn't tell you about real life! But we press on.

Despite our bad luck with silkworms, we adopted a new family member. We had two dogs for about ten years. Then, about two years ago, our beagle died. Just got old. After getting over missing him, we decided a new dog might be good for us and for our surviving, lonely dog. On Saturday, we finally found the perfect match. We tried the SPCA, but the dog we picked out didn't get along with our Mulligan. The one that did, wasn't terribly interested in us. So, we went to the city animal shelter. There, it is less a question of whether a person will find a dog to take home and more, can I limit myself to just one?

It was hard, mostly because they all wanted to come home with us, but we cannot adopt 65 dogs, as much as we would like to. Seriously.

After much deliberation, we decided on one.

She's pretty sweet and chill. The perfect writing partner. Lays on the carpet in front of my desk and keeps me company along the lonely path of writing. If only she could get the potty-training thing down...before the next batch of silkworms arrives.

If this were fiction, I would so make that happen!

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I couldn't help but break with my regular, frenetic, MFA writing/studying routine to post about this. I was lying in bed the other night, reading frenetically. Where the Red Fern Grows. A classic I've avoided because it suffers from the painful dead dog syndrome, actually two dead dogs. But, in the name of higher education, I'd decided to tackle it.

I was just getting to the good part where Billy catches his first coon. In the story, he runs, yelling, back to the farm to tell his family. He's screaming and jumping and hooting and hollering. He's so worked up, his mother thinks he's been bitten by a snake. She drops everything and runs to help him.

When she discovers it's not a snake bite at all but a captured raccoon, she threatens to give Billy a sound thrashing.

Now, you have to remember, this story takes place in the back country of the Ozark mountains in northeastern Oklahoma, about an hour and a half from where I live. As close to home as it gets, really. Plus, it's nighttime. The kids are in bed. My husband is out late at a meeting. I'm alone. With the dog. And I'm reading about snakes. Yeessh.

Something tickles my arm. I reach over to brush it off, thinking my imagination is really getting the better of me. Out of the corner of my eye, I see something scurry off across my bed. I bolt upright. I look.

It's a scorpion.

"Holy Sh**!"

At least, I think that's what I said. I was busy rocketing out of my bed as far away from the scorpion as possible. Practically hyperventilating, I dash to the phone and call my dad. Yes, I'm five again, tops, and hoping my father can fix it all. His advice: Kill it.

Gulp. I have to kill a scorpion. In. My. Bed.

Sorry, Wilson Rawls, but now Where the Red Fern Grows not only suffers from the dead dog syndrome but also the dead scorpion one too. After I'd beaten the scorpion very very flat, I called my husband and told him he had to come home right now.

When he finally got home and found me a shell-shocked bundle of jumpy nerves huddled up under a blanket upstairs on the sofa as far away from my bed and any other scorpions that might be lurking, my husband had a hard time not laughing. In his defense, I must have beena comical sight, only I didn't feel a comical sight. I wanted sympathy. Indignation. Deadly, bug-killing chemicals.

But my husband is from Germany. They don't have scorpions. He doesn't get the whole, "They can hurt you" factor. To make matters worse, he is a Scorpio. He teased that I shouldn't have smashed a family member. Ugh.

Seeing as I was not going to get the needed overdose of understanding and sympathy from him, I called my girlfriend down the street, who hates bugs, ALL bugs. Okay, so maybe that was a little selfish, but I needed a lifeline! My friend really rose to the occasion. She listened. She was sympathetic. Indignant. But in the end, there were two of us not sleeping that night.

Many many dollars later (I called the bug guy out to douse the house; so did my poor friend), I am happy to say, the only scorpio(n) I've slept with for many a night is my husband...I hope.

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