Sci-Fi Flesh Dissolving Monster or Lawn Pest?

Nothing is more enjoyable than sitting outside on a cool Kansas evening listening to live music and watching the sun set. That is until a couple days later when you realize chiggers showed up at the same party you attended. Over 48 hours, music and breeze-induced peace and relaxation turns into itchy torture. The hungry, invisible insect larvae ruin family picnics, exciting baseball games, plum picking, and a thousand other pleasurable summer activities.

I always thought these miniscule red bugs were actual insects, but after researching them, I’ve discovered they’re larval stages of the harvest mite. In the egg stage and insect stages, these critters could care less about dining on human flesh. Unfortunately, in their in between condition, our bodies are a great choice for a tasty meal.

Another misconception I had was that these guys drink our blood. Nope, that’s a tick and mosquito activity. Chiggers inject enzymes that dissolve flesh. A couple of things go on after this point. Surrounding cells soup up, and nearby skin hardens, often forming a firm bump. This area contains the chigger’s stylostome  or feeding tube. Yep, we’re talking bug straw into your liquefied cells. Is that science fiction or what?

I’d also been led to believe that these unseen beings laid eggs in my skin so that painting the irritation with nail polish would suffocate the little devils. No, these are larva. They aren’t sexually mature, so there aren’t any reproductive activities occurring. That intense, sleep disturbing itch is the human body’s reaction to those enzymes turning tissue into consumable goop for these temporary occupants.

It takes about 24 to 48 hours for this chemical reaction to produce the telltale lesions around ankles, behind knees, near underwear and waistband lines, and armpits. (Making people itch in those areas is inspired cruelty, don’tcha think?) As a result, you have to be careful when making assumptions about where your bites originated. It’s best to consider where you were the day or two before when you want to cast aspersions on a specific lawn or park.

To avoid insane torment, you could stay inside. However, you’d miss good times. You could wait until outside conditions were either below 60 degrees F or above 99 degrees F. Temperatures at those extremes tend to dampen fun any way so that’s not a good option. You can liberally use bug spray containing DEET. If you don’t want to do that, you can soap yourself and shower extremely well after an outdoor adventure and hope for the best. Do the same for your clothing so you don’t put old clothes on the next day and reintroduce this problem.

If you are targeted, it’s two or three days of serious annoyance. Unlike ticks and other insect, chiggers don’t inject disease-causing bacteria as ticks do. Infections and complications occur because people scratch, break skin, and introduce infection. It’s best to ignore that particular itch.

Because nothing live is in the bump, it’s useless to coat it with nail polish or other lacquers. Calamine lotion and cortisone cream provide some relief. Benadryl may help, and it can aid people in falling asleep despite nagging reminders of the good time that was.

My great grandpa was sure chiggers had to be one of the greatest curses sharing our planet. I agree. It’s a sad day when you won’t trek through tall grasses because you might pick up invisible critters that make your life miserable for a week.

Barbed Wire and Torn Jeans Go Together Like Peanut Butter and Jelly

Some people like to buy jeans with holes already in the fabric. I, however, prefer my new britches with only traditional waist and leg openings. Unfortunately, because I’m not good at crossing barbwire fences, I’ve ripped some fashionable extra tears in my denims.

 One pair had a rent in the upper inseam that I was able to mend well enough to wear them in public. The other I managed to catch by the seater, and no matter how tiny my stitches were, I couldn’t piece that “L”shaped rip together without a visible patch. Regardless of how many young folks buy jeans with intentional rips, it just isn’t cool to be in public only to realize your needlecraft failed, leaving your undies on display.

Despite initial appearances, this article isn’t really about torn jeans. They’re simply a result of ineffective efforts to get from one side of barbed wire to the other. People who’ve lived long in this country know fence crossing is an art. It isn’t something you wake up one morning to discover is your area of expertise. If author Malcolm Gladwell is correct, you’d need to climb over about 9,999 such enclosures before you were an expert. While I’m not sure that number is necessary, I know it takes practice to perform this feat without damaging fence, flesh, or pants.

Before you think about your own well-being or that of your clothing when crossing these barriers, you have to be sure the fence doesn’t get messed up when you either lift a leg over or stretch the top and middle wires wide enough to allow an  adult to squeeze through. Fixing fence is no fun, so you don’t want to set yourself up for stapling line back on posts or having to splice it. If you’re responsible, you aren’t going to mess up a landowner’s hard work and then not repair it.

Once you’ve made sure you aren’t damaging that wire barricade, you need to decide whether you have long enough legs  or  superhuman leaping power to get yourself over the obstacle without jabbing yourself in some tender parts. It’s difficult to maintain composure among a group of friends and hunting buddies when you’ve hung your inner thigh up on a metal projectile. It’s more challenging to act like everything is fine with your nether regions attached to that fence, and you can’t find a place to grab the torturous cable without catching hand flesh and ripping it as well.

If you can’t make it over the obstacle, you need to squeeze your hunting-gear-encased torso between taut lines and then drag your legs through one at a time. For folks who don’t practice yoga regularly, this is difficult. You’re also depending on a fallible human to spread those lines wide. Sometimes the responsible party gets distracted. All the apologies in the world don’t make it feel better when you’ve been twanged between two strands of barbed wire—and that’s after you get your clothes and hair detached.

I’ve ripped enough almost-new jeans to wonder if some outdoors person who wasn’t very good at crossing barbed wire fences was responsible for making torn denims fashionable. I don’t have to pay extra for torn pants. A trip out of doors updates my wardrobe considerably.

Get Home When the Streetlights Go On

After pulling weeds, mowing lawns, playing, or swimming under hot summer sun, evening breezes provided welcome relief during games of softball and freeze tag played at dusk during my childhood. As a youngster, I loved being outside under lavender, apricot, and rose tinted  skies when cool winds blew  and tangled hair into Medusa-like snakes and tickled sunburnt skin. This was a such a positive part of my life that I still enjoy replaying mental videos of evenings my brother and I invented new games or enjoyed old standbys with neighborhood kids after supper.

These end of day activities also trained me to respond physically to streetlights flickering on just as Pavlov trained dogs to react to ringing dinner bells. No, I didn’t start salivating when those bulbs lit up, but I did know to hurry home for the night if I wanted to continue to stay outside with my pals until later  streetlights brightened future June, July, and August nights. Mom’s tone was clear about following this directive, and I knew she meant what she said. Decades later, seeing this golden glow silhouetted by twilight still triggers a need to hustle inside for an evening bath and a good read before bedtime. 

These days, as I enjoy cool evening breezes on the patio, I hear kids competing loudly for the next shot at the basketball goals a few blocks away. Just north of us is a community park where children swing, slide, struggle up the climbing wall, and toss sycamore balls and acorns in the air. Their laughter floats into my yard on cool evening zephyrs. Their voices and giggles transport me back to my own carefree childhood and the recollection of knowing a streetlight turning on meant it was time to halt my fun and skedaddle home.

Apparently, this signal still works because many nights when I’m working in the flowerbed or garden, twilight sounds shift from singing birds and laughing children to that faint electronic buzz emitted by towering lamps high overhead. It isn’t long before insect hums accompany that manmade sound. Chirping crickets and buzzing cicadas in nearby trees join distant frogs and Wodehouse toads to add a rhythmic backbeat sounding like quickly shaken maracas and a throbbing bass in the descending darkness. Most little kids and their noises are tucked inside lighted rooms or already in bed as beetles hum and pop when they fly too close to those yellow beams.

Despite these intriguing reverberations, I often don’t stay outside long enough to hear all the nigh t sounds. Due to my mother’s effective training during my early years, this body still responds to that cue drilled into me as a little girl. You’d better get home as soon as the street light goes on. Even though it’s been eons since I had to follow that command, every fiber in my carcass answers to that golden flicker. It’s a magnet that pulls me indoors.

Skunked Again

It’s been a while, and I let down my guard--the consequence, not one but two skunked dogs. In town, to add insult to injury.

When I lived along the banks of Big Creek, almost three miles west of Ellis, I expected dog/skunk encounters every year, and we had them. I kept a supply of ingredients to make my magic de-scenting potion and knew I’d use them every few months. A year and half of living in the small burg of Logan with no Pepe Le Pew encounters spoiled me. I never thought about the fact that skunks don’t read city limit signs.

After a Friday night cruise into the countryside to watch dusk descend over green pastures and wheat fields, we arrived home ready to settle in for the evening. It wasn’t three minutes before that acrid, eye-burning smell rode a gentle south breeze from behind our shed into windows open to welcome fresh spring air. That was a joke. About the time my nose hit high alert, my husband let me know what triggered the stink bomb.

 Yes, our beloved grand-pups had insulted a black and white kitty as it passed through their territory. Working in tandem to drive the invader away, they’d come close to that trespasser’s backside. The direct shot blasted both with enough stench to coat ten pooches. Their hangdog looks told me they knew it.

I hurriedly concocted a triple dose of hydrogen peroxide, baking soda, and dish soap before slipping into raggedy clothes I could toss if necessary. One at a time, I doused each pooch and scrubbed relentlessly. After the first bath, my insulted nostrils and eyes couldn’t tell if I’d succeeded or not in banishing the offending odor from dog one’s fur. Using shop towels, I rubbed him down and lugged him outside to shake remaining droplets from his coat.

Round two with pet number two began soon after. That chunky boy didn’t seem quite so odiferous, and he’d had a recent shearing at the groomers, so he was a little easier to de-scent. Due to his size, he was  harder to maneuver in the laundry room sink, but we got the job done and kept the water where it belonged. He, too, got a toweling before I transported him outside to join his partner in crime.

It didn’t take more than a sniff of dog one to realize it was good thing I’d made so much of the special elixir. That guy needed a second dose of my un-skunking solution. He must’ve read my mind because he tried to scurry out of reach, but it was too late. He was heading back to the washtub and the last of the skin tingling cleanser.

Both dogs had that unmanageable hair look caused by a recent bath. I’m not picking up much residual scent from the boys, but that skunk certainly laid a shot pattern over our yard. Every time I walk out back, I can tell it visited. I’m hoping good rain will  take care of that problem.

Memorial Day Memories—Learning Family Stories Around Headstones

Peonies blooming, flags flying from light posts, and alumni celebrations signal Memorial Day’s arrival. For some families it’s time to camp at the lake or picnic in the backyard. No matter what I do to celebrate this holiday, this last weekend in May is a reminder of trips to the family cemetery and lessons learned about long dead ancestors.

Just saying Memorial Day brings back memories of Grandma Lottie lugging her store of floral arrangements up from her basement. She’d lay them all over her back porch and examine them for wear and tear--no worn out arrangements for her deceased loved ones. Then she’d make certain each had appropriate metal clothes hangers clipped in two to anchor them into Southwest Kansas soil until it was time to retrieve them for another year.

After she’d inspected and repaired her wreathes and bouquets, she’d relegate them to boxes destined for particular cemeteries where deceased relatives rested. By the time she and grandpa finished, the trunk was full and the journey ready to begin.

I’d find my place in the backseat of their Mercury and we’d hit that asphalt ribbon guiding us toward Dodge, Jetmore, and Ford. I loved sitting behind them, listening to their reminiscences of people I never met. 

During these drives over green prairies, I learned about a family branch that immigrated to northwest Kansas in the early 1870s. Once there, several families homesteaded and formed the little community of Devizes, named after their hometown in Canada. One of these great greats was a Methodist Circuit rider who served rural residents living in dugouts along Beaver and Sappa Creeks. After the Cheyenne Breakout in 1878, he buried some settlers killed in that incident.

I always wondered if his tiny wife, daughter of a ship captain on the Great Lakes, saw the similarity between waves on huge bodies of water and the ripples of wind moving prairie grasses in rolling surges. I know she saw the grass because she hid her children in it when she heard Indians traveled near their homestead.

Another side of the family moved first from Kentucky to Indiana and then to Kansas as their families expanded and they needed more resources to support them. We have photos of their homestead, livery stable, general merchandise store, and boarding house in Ford, where they settled. By the time I came along, I realized I’d only see that family name engraved on headstones at the cemetery. We descended from the female side, and that great grandma’s name changed when she married into the Canadian branch I mentioned earlier.

At each gravesite, Grandma and Grandpa continued sharing tales of those who rested beneath our feet. Though I’d hardly met a single soul resting in those hallowed plots, I thought I knew them personally. I learned what they drove, whether it was wagon or a Model T. I learned who their children were and what they served at family dinners.

Through these annual narratives, I understood what it took to survive and thrive in a land that nature designed to suit nomads. Looking back, I’m sure these pilgrimages with my grandparents triggered my love for this prairie that brought me home to Kansas.