A LAUNDRY ROOM STORY

     A crane fly distracted me from my usual laundry room reading this morning. Somehow four of its legs had become stuck on some heavy (for the bug anyway) lint making it difficult for the creature to fly. I took pity on the insect's exhausting struggle to extricate itself from what would almost certainly be a death sentence but figuring there was nothing I could do, I continued with my reading. In between paragraphs, the bug would fly with apparent difficulty back into view coming to rest on either the floor or the table edge or even hang from the central bar of a neighbor's bicycle making futile attempts to free its legs. Of all the ways insects can die, this way seemed particularly unfair. The problem was, how to help it without accidentally severing its legs?

No matter how nice you may think I am for desiring to help this insect, remember that I did take the time to get my camera from my apartment to document its suffering first

     I decided against ending the crane fly's misery on the off-chance fortune might smile upon the insect, freeing it from this trap and I have to admit, I wanted the bug to win in this particular struggle. But this outcome had not become reality as my laundry neared completion. I didn't want to leave having tried nothing and looking at my bookmark, I saw a possible solution to the fly's dilemma.

     The insect landed near me again and using the bookmark's edge as a kind of knife, I managed to (after a few attempts...I can't exactly blame the bug for trying to get away from me now can I?) cut away the heaviest parts of the fibers and not sever its legs while doing so. Hooray! A happy ending for the crane fly. Now all I had to do was encourage it to the door and it would be free to live or die in its proper environment. The insect, newly unburdened in flight and with apparent ease, flew near the ceiling of the room and I swear to you, the first place it landed...this happened.

Seriously?

     The venting pipe the crane fly had settled upon after its first taste of freedom, of all the places it could have landed, was the only place in the laundry room covered in the same sticky lint which had gotten it into trouble in the first place. One unburdened flight...that's all it got. I folded my laundry, turned out the light, closed the door, and never looked back.

     Fuck that crane fly!