Box of Bugs

Back in the mid-80s I worked for a restaurant downtown, a nice place, doing food-prep and washing dishes. I worked till about ten at night, went out and drank beer with my friends afterwards, slept till noon. I lived in a big, red, ugly house over on 17th and A. We entertained frequently, my roommates and I, and didn't move around a whole lot in the heat of the day if it could be helped.

One afternoon I went in to work. My boss said "Here, we got some boxes of romaine lettuce in, why don't you get it ready."

This I set to do, filled a big sink with lukewarm water, dumped in the heads of romaine, stirred them about with a stainless steel paddle, to get any gobs of mud or sand off them. Once they had soaked awhile I'd take them out and chop them and spin them dry, load it all into plastic tubs with paper-towells lining the bottom and stack them back in the walk-in cooler. No problem.

Oops, yes , there was a problem. Or actually hundreds of little problems. The water was full of lady-bugs, all over the top of the water. I suppose the cool air in the truck had put them into hibernation. The warm water had awakened them. It was like the sinking of a cruise ship!

I didn't want them to drown. I stuck my arms in the water, swished them very slowly to-and-fro. They clung to my arms , the stragglers I scooped up with the paddle, and poked them off of it into a cup, got a handfull or so. I poked my head around the corner (Didn't want my boss to see me covered with bugs) into the grill area and said "Back in a minute."

I trotted down the stairs and into the bright heat of the alley, our "smoke-lounge", carrying my little charges along.

So far so good. Once there, some of them began to hop or fly off. Most of them were still trying to figure out their predicament, or liked it fine where they were. I figured if they dried off quicker they would take off and my work would be done here and I could go back upstairs. It was kind of strange feeling all those tiny feet on my skin, but after all they were lady-birds, not mosquitoes or cockroaches or centipedes.

I held my arms up, waved them gently in the breeze. I reminded me of one of those plastic bell-divers you see in people's tropical fish-tanks. Wave this arm, wave that arm, blow some bubbles. Wave this arm, wave that arm, blow some bubbles. Repeat.

It was Friday afternoon, getting on 5:20. Lincoln's best and brightest were off work and lookin to get dinner! Here came two. I think of them as being named Chad Ubber and Jill-Bethe Tightcoat. These were young, sprassi, salad-eatin machines! The kind of folks you'd see over at The Foxy Lady, dancing to Bruce Springsteen's Born in the USA and waving little flags they handed out at the bar whenever that song was played. And around the corner and into the alley this twosome came. We were face to face. We stared at each other across an impassible distance.

Did I mention I was wearing white pants, a white t-shirt, a hairnet and rubber boots? Well I was. And my arms were still crawling with lady-bugs.

Whatever personal ritual Chad and Jill-Bethe had stumbled upon, they made clear they didn't want to be a part of it. They fled, Chad guiding and pulling, Pepsi tick-tick-ticking in her pumps. "Just keep walking!" he said, sounding like Indiana Jones.

Would it have made a difference, their impression of me and so forth, if I had followed? Braying out "NO STOP WAIT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THEY CAME HERE IN A BOX AND THEY MUST FLY!!" or something like that?

Well, Chad, Jill-Bethe with an 'e', if you're out there somewhere and by some chance you are reading this, now you will understand.