“a touching story,” by sarah.
once upon a time, two days ago, i noticed the beginning of an ant mound–a fire ant mound–in the sidewalk crack immediately next to my front door. at least i thought it was an ant mound. it looked like an ant mound, felt like an ant mound, smelled like an ant mound (ok, i didn’t actually feel it or smell it, but i imagined it would feel and smell like an ant mount), but i couldn’t really be sure because i didn’t actually see any ants. and thus my immediate impulse to spray the dirt crumbs with insect killer was overcome by my basic curiosity and desire to find out if this was indeed the first stage of ant mound construction or if it was something else even more intriguing being cleverly disguised as an ant mound.
monday night passed. yesterday morning i awoke to find that the previous night’s purported ant mound had apparently been abandoned in favor of a somehow more suitable site about a foot away from the old construction site. the new site was located along the edge of the sidewalk and flower bed. this mound was obviously being constructed under stealth tactics, as the dirt used for the mound was nearly the same color as the dirt already in the flower bed. camouflage! the source of these mounds was still unknown, as i spotted no insects or ants, but i was impressed with their survival tactics.
tuesday passed. i came home last night and nothing had changed. i wondered if the unknown builders had moved elsewhere.
tuesday night passed.
i awoke this morning and walked out the door, only to nearly step right in the middle of a huge pile of dirt. overnight, a third mound had sprung up in a third location. my cute little mystery builders had finally shown their faces.
swarming fire ants constructed a 1.5-feet long by 6-inch wide radioactive vampire fire ant mountain of DOOM!!!
ok, maybe not radioactive and vampire, but it felt like it.
i yelped. i was blinded with visions of jen’s bandaged hand from last fall when, unbeknownst to her, fire ants stealthily crept up her arm and all bit on command, leaving her with at least a hundred stinging welts and a swollen hand. aaaaaah!
recovering my composure, i stepped back and bent down long enough to confirm that yes, they were fire ants, and no, there weren’t any crawling up my legs. i calmly went back into my apartment and straight to the cabinet under the sink, where i extracted a large orange spray can and went back outside.
“say your prayers, ants,” i muttered under my breath as i popped the plastic top off the can. my finger moved in slow motion toward the trigger as a tumbleweed blew across the sidewalk. somewhere, a door slammed. in an instant, the ants were doused in a rain of all-purpose ant/roach/spider killer. i continued to spray their enormous mound of dirt for a good 30 seconds, until every ant (and a roly poly who had the misfortune to be in the wrong place at the wrong time) was writhing in apparent pain on the sidewalk. they never knew what hit them.
“ha HA,” i crowed. and i put the ant killer back inside and went to work.
the end.
