I saw something the other day that made me gasp in terror; something I hadn’t seen in well over six months and wouldn’t mind not seeing again for another 600 months.
It was a hornet.
I’m pretty sure that I am the reason why the word “beeline” was invented, because whenever I spot a wasp, bee or yellow jacket, I make a beeline for shelter.
Our friend in Texas isn’t much help. For some reason, he enjoys telling me horror stories about the killer bees in his state. And with every story, the bees get bigger and meaner. I wouldn’t be surprised if in his next e-mail, he tells me that a swarm of bees flew off with a school bus.
I guess I’m lucky to live in a state that’s so cold, even if the killer bees were given complimentary first-class tickets to come here, they’d refuse. Still, a few incidents in the past have led me to suspect that some of the killer bees’ distant cousins may be hiding out here in the state and secretly forming an army.
One weekend, for example, my husband and I were riding down Route 28 when he suddenly pulled the car over to the side of the road, slammed the gearshift into park and jumped out of the car. In the middle of the road, he proceeded to do a terrific imitation of Michael Flatley in Riverdance.
“Honey, I really appreciate the entertainment,” I called out to him.
“But I think you’re about to get run over by a truck!”
“Something’s down the back of my shirt biting me!” he shouted as the truck swerved around him.
I got out of the car, yanked him to the side of the road, and untucked his shirt. When I shook it, out flew a yellow jacket. Unfortunately, it left its calling card behind - two big red welts on my husband’s back.
And if that incident weren’t bad enough, just a few days later, we were sitting in the living room when a huge shadow suddenly moved across the wall. It was a hornet…the biggest and meanest-looking hornet I had ever seen…the Hulk Hogan of hornets.
My husband and I both froze. “Go get the fly swatter,” he whispered to me, not even moving his lips.
“You’re closer to the kitchen than I am,” I whispered back. “Why don’t YOU go get it?”
“Because I got stung the last time. It’s your turn.”
We both sat there, our eyes following the hornet until it came to rest on a ceiling beam too high for either of us to reach with anything shorter than a broom.
“He’s landed,” my husband said. “Now’s your chance. Go get the fly swatter.”
“But I’ll have to stand on a chair to reach it with a fly swatter,” I protested.
“Then get a chair, too, while you’re out in the kitchen,” he said.
Slowly, one measured step at a time, my eyes fixed on the hornet, I inched my way out to the kitchen and grabbed the fly swatter.
“Don’t we have any wasp spray?” my husband called out to me.
“Yeah, but it’s only for outdoor use,” I answered.
“So? The hornet won’t know the difference!”
“No, but WE will when the fumes turn our lungs into raisins!”
I crept back into the living room and handed the swatter to my husband.
“What do you want me to do with this?” he asked.
By then, I could have given him a few creative suggestions, but I held my tongue. “Kill the hornet!” I said. “You’re taller than I am.”
Sighing, my husband stood and began waving the fly swatter in the general direction of the beam on which the hornet still was perched. Within seconds, the winged assassin swooped down toward us. My husband ducked and started to run as I stood screaming, “Don’t run! Kill it!”
Suddenly my husband stopped, turned around and, grasping the fly swatter as if it were a baseball bat, took his best Joe DiMaggio swing at the hornet. I heard a “whap” and then a “ping.”
“I got him!” my husband cheered. “A home run!”
“I won’t relax until you show me the body,” I said.
We searched the room for the next 20 minutes and found nothing.
“Maybe you just stunned him,” I said. “And when he wakes up, he’s going to be one mighty ticked-off hornet. Why did you hit him in mid-air anyway? Why didn’t you wait till he landed on something?”
“Believe me, he’s dead,” my husband said. “I hit him so hard, it was like a bug hitting a windshield.”
“Then we should have heard a ‘splat’!” I said.
Unconcerned, my husband decided to go to bed. I, on the other hand, could not even begin to think about sleeping while there still was the remote possibility that a revenge-crazed hornet was on the loose somewhere in the house.
Which brings me to the hornet I saw the other day. It looked familiar. And I’m pretty sure it was missing a leg.
Just to be safe, I’m buying a case of Raid.
