June 25, 2013

Zap

I know this is hugely environmentally incorrect of me, but I really miss the electric bug zappers. I've mentioned my nostalgia for one of the quintessential sounds of summer before, but allow me to expound on that.
The bug-zapper is a purely American device. Only here would we decide to electrocute our insects. If I recall my youth correctly, they were all the rage in the late 70s and early 80s.
Knowing that bug zappers kill mostly beneficial insects and that they "can spread a mist containing insect parts up to about 7 feet from the device," is preventing me from reliving my youth, but I still miss the sound of their little winged deaths.
They are part of that perfect summer. The summer when I wasn't a kid anymore. When I finally had the word "teen" at the end of my age. I was sooooo mature.
We would go out riding our bikes after dinner through the woodsy bike paths and suburban streets of the precious little town I lived in, sure that we were on the brink of something momentous. And long after dark, we'd arrive back home and I'd climb into bed thinking that just around the corner was the mythic High School. That magical summer all the wonder was still imagined and the reality hadn't dampened our flights of fancy.

The Dzzzzt...  dzzzzt    ...dzzzzt of frying insects serenaded the summer nights when we would take our long bike rides to nowhere or play kick the can until it was so dark you couldn't see the can.
We'd fall asleep to their sound as the jerky rhythm section for the symphony of crickets and tree frogs that whirred and chirrupped through the night.



1 comment:

FreshGreenKim said...

You could always look for a neighborhood game of four square, basketball, or volleyball...