Bee All That You Can Bee

Spring has sproinged. The weather is beautiful, the back yard is now cleared of leaves so that we can see the dirt growing, the flowers are blooming, and the bees are buzzing.

The bees. The bees out here are HUGE. Like hummingbirds. Okay, hummingbirds aren’t huge, but you see a bumblebee the size of a hummingbird, you say, “Holy Moly Guacamole! That’s one HUGE bumblebee!”

The boys began the day frightened of the bees. Running away from them. Holing themselves up in their teeny-tiny “fortress” in the back yard, pressing a pretend button to repel the bees. Slowly, gradually, they grew braver. Calling out the bees, then retreating to their fortress.

Now? Now my children are Bee Hunters. Digging through their toy boxes to build up an arsenal, they fill their Scooby-Doo lunch boxes with such necessary ammunition as empty plastic Easter eggs, jacks, the Little Mermaid’s tail, Lego’s, a ball point pen, Cinderella’s wedding dress, a plastic frog and snake, Malibu Barbie’s bikini top, and an inch-and-a-half tall plastic horse show trophy.

“We’re going to catch him in this,” Chris says, holding up the plastic Easter egg, “and put this in there,” he added, pointing out the oversized yellow jack.

“Yeah!” I responded enthusiastically. “Then you can shake it up!” Okay, I shouldn’t have said that.

“We don’t want to kill the bee. We only want to hurt him. Then we will keep him in this cage to be our pet,” said John. This is actually progress. More on that some other time.

I raised an eyebrow. This is my favorite facial expression, second only to eye rolling. “Let me get this straight. You want to catch a bee, hurt him so that he is angry with you, and then keep him as a pet? You want a bee with a personal vendetta against you as a pet?”

“Well, we’re never going to let him out.” Reason #48 why we are never getting another kitten.

This little adventure kept them entertained until nightfall, and now they return to me smudge-faced, dirty-kneed and tired, but thankfully, free of stings.

I wonder if this is how Steve Irwin started out?