I live with cockroaches I’ll admit it but I’m a New Yorker so I’m used to them. I don’t like them though. One time I lived with so many I got in the habit of flicking them hard if they crept within range. But my squeamishness level has risen and when I see one I get flustered and fill with anxiety. Sometimes I think I see an expression on their faces. Expressions almost cartoonish of dread. I always try to kill them, raging instinct, yet whether I catch them or not afterwards immediately I am drowned in remorse. I don’t want to fear them or hate them. Few other beasts have the ability to rattle me quite so.
So when the other day I came across a big fat cockroach chowing down in the bottom of a large bowl of rice I took the opportunity to seal him into that bowl by applying the flat rubber lid suctioned closed. Sealed him up and I was giggling right away with contentment at this suitable revenge. Ha ha ha you are my prisoner now. He had plenty of air and all the food he could stuff is ridiculous fangs into so I wasn’t concerned about him but what I did know was that he was panicked with anxiety. Payback.
After about an hour commonsense woke me and I set the fellow free, albeit outside of my house.
Ever since my game with the roach I have noticed his brethren creeping from their home in the stove, the next wave of soldiers, the frontline food finders. And for some reason I am less prone to want to attack them. The score has been settled. Except when I think about big fat old grandpa roach who I mercilessly threw out of my home after ‘water-boarding’ him and I rue I have parted him from his family forever. I am a monster.
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Everyone on the Planet has a Cockroach story. Mine was also in Florida when hubby and I went on vacation there 100 years ago.
After checking into the Swanky Hotel, we were taken to our room which was literally crawling from floor to ceiling with HUNDREDS of Cockroaches. At first I thought I was looking at psychedelic wallpaper and then I realized the horrible truth.
Ordering my laid back English husband to pick up our luggage, I marched in full Mediterranean fury up to Reception. I started screaming at the lady behind the desk that after having endured a hideous transatlantic flight, I now had to walk into my hotel room to be greeted by a million cockroaches!
“Oh no ” she said “They’re not cockroaches, they’re Palmetto Bugs”.
“I don’t care what you choose to call them” I replied “They are f**king cockroaches, and they f**king fly”.
This hotel tart was very snooty and stroppy and was not at all keen about giving us another room until I threatened to camp out in the lobby and stay there like a hobo for the next 3 weeks.
Half an hour later we were upgraded to a suite which had a sitting room and 2 bathrooms and had been fumigated to within an inch of its life.
So you see my dear friend, these particular Cockroaches or Palmetto Bugs as the Floridians like to refer to them did me and spousey a huge favour.
We had a fabulous time! xxxxx