Moth.
Specifically, the moth which, for the past three nights, has appeared in my bedroom at exactly midnight, flapping skritchily at the walls in a misguided bid for freedom before, just as inexplicably, vanishing again. I never see it during the day. It’s not there when the lights are on – which is odd, given the normal mothly passtime of bashing into fluorescent surfaces until concussion sets in. It doesn’t appear in any other room of the house, nor is it there when I wake up. Instead, it waits for the witching hour and appears, suddenly and mysteriously, directly above my right ear, where it hovers loudly before fluttering vigorously against the corner nearest my bedside table for five or ten minutes.
A very fanciful part of me wonders if it’s a Spirit Moth, come to bestow some divine entomological wisdom. After all, I’ve had some interesting experiences with moths. As a child, I once inhaled a live moth through a drinking draw, felt it beating feebly against my tongue and spat it out, whereupon it limped off along the carpet. (That powdery stuff on their wings, just FYI? It tastes like medicine.) And then there was my encounter with The Biggest Moth In The World, which – and I’m not making this up – flew into our glass windows and actually shook the room with its impact, being, as it was, the size of a small bird. Or maybe it was a small bird – anyway. The point is, moths clearly feature in my history.
So what, I wonder, is this one trying to tell me?
