Unlike most people, I’m not very fond of bugs. I won’t even go into my downright loathing of spiders, as it strays from the point, but consider that factoid bonus material. Loathing.

Last night there were thousands of ants on the front porch of my apartment building. I say this without exaggeration or hyperbole (as in “I ate a thousand burritos for lunch” or “I could go for a million naps right now”), but as actual fact. Thousands of little black marauders making their way from the cracked concrete porch and going…well, going nowhere. Just running around in dumb ant circles. There were several ants with wings amongst the group as well. They weren’t flying, though, which made me angry. It’s like they take their wings for granted. Had I wings, I’d use them almost constantly just because I could. If I needed something from across the room, you can be damn sure I’d take the mid-air route to get it.

When I first came across the insect horde, they had themselves contained to the split concrete slab by the door and had no interest in going out into the lawn or into the building itself. I was kind of okay with that. A couple hops and I could get by. As the night wore on, however, the whole situation kept bugging me (get it?). I decided to go back down and check. Their number had increased by several hundred and at least a hundred of that several hundred was inside the front door. I knew what I needed to do.

I ran back upstairs to find bug spray. The only Raid I had was meant to be used indoors to kill fleas. I mentally rearranged that to say that it is to be used anywhere to kill whatever you want. I took the can downstairs and destroyed the collection of beasties that had made their way indoors. Then the taste for blood (do ants have blood? must research) hit me and I took the can outside. About half a can later and the frantic antapalooza was reduced to an ant battlefield littered with thousands of tiny black corpses. My work was done with no remorse. Even when I was walking across the warzone and it sounded like I was treading through snow, I only got a little grossed out. I was right, they were wrong.

As my son and I left the building this morning, we hopped past the Porch Of The Dead. He asked what they were and I explained they were ants dead due to my diligent work. He looked at them and then looked at me and asked “Why?” I verbally fumbled and stuttered, having no real answer. I don’t think it’s right to teach your child to kill anything that just bothers you, so I had no firm reply. Now I feel bad.

The moral of the story is that when you kill things, don’t show your children the bodies.

b

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