Dear Giant Moth That I Found In My Bedroom
Posted 14 June 2008 in Life, the Universe, and Everything by Catriona
You are extremely beautiful. You are also enormous.
And you scare the pants off me. (Almost literally, in this case, since I found you while I was searching for clean clothes.)
I don’t know why you and so many of your brethren are coming to Brisbane these days—I believe it has to do with increased rain on the coast and therefore a plentiful food supply.
That’s fantastic! Eat and . . . well, no, don’t multiply. Much. Just don’t die out, because you are lovely.
But, and correct me if I’m wrong here, I don’t think that my bedroom is your natural habitat.
And I am very, very scared of you.
Does that make me a coward, giant moth? Probably. But I think I’ll just stay out here in the living room for now.
So I want to make a deal with you, giant moth.
There’s the window. Can you see the window? If not, I’ll just pick you up gently—no, let’s be serious for a moment. Someone else—who is not scared of you or, perhaps, is more scared of me than of you—will pick you up very gently and take you to the window.
Because we don’t want to hurt you, giant moth. We definitely don’t want to kill you. But I find not being able to enter my bedroom rather inconvenient.
So we’ll see you out the window, and you can fly free to eat thistles—or whichever food source you prefer—and find a companion, and circle futilely around lampposts on balmy Brisbane nights.
Does that sound like a fair compromise, giant moth?
But, before you go, I will say one thing.
I am grateful to you, giant moth, for one thing.
I am grateful that you are not one of those Hercules moths with the twenty-seven-centimetre wingspans that you find in Northern Queensland.
Because if I found one of those in my bedroom, I would have to abandon the house.
Share your thoughts [2]
1
Matthew Smith wrote at Jun 17, 02:15 am
As an ex-Cairnsite, I can confirm that those Hercules moths are really fricken huge and do regularly attack bushwalkers, beheading them and drinking their blood before they can call for help. And they have an interesting transparent patch on the wings.
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Catriona wrote at Jun 17, 02:28 am
I’d never come across them before (and sincerely hope to never come across them in person—are they actually omnipresent in Cairns? Because if so, I must never, ever visit there) and the first photo I saw was a child standing, grinning, in front of a moth whose wingspan was as wide as his shoulders.
I’m that phobic about them that I can’t even stand to look at the pictures—I had to call Nick in to shut the browser down for me.
I know I’m a coward, I do—but I just can’t be having with insects. And we seem to have such enormous insects in Australia. It doesn’t seem fair, really.