Antagonistic

I disturbed an ant hill in the yard this week. Though to be fair, the frickin’ ant hill disturbed me first. I’d planted a rose in the middle of the backyard just after Valentine’s Day (romantic) and I noticed, of late, it was looking a bit unhappy.

Standing in the kitchen waiting for the kettle to boil, I’d looked out the window and noticed a weird bump in the soil around it. And, though I knew I should wait till later as I was in the middle of a work thing, curiosity got the better of me. I went outside and I prodded the bump with a stick. And low and behold, it was an ant alapalooza

The ants were unsurprisingly not impressed, and equally unsurprisingly neither was I. The result was a whole load of panic and scurrying from the ants’ side, and a squeal and a collection of my favorite curse words from mine.

This attracted the attention of the chickens who stick their beaks in everything going on in the backyard, and they ran over for a closer inspection of the action. A couple of the chickens - Nuggets, Margo, and Norma -recognized this was an opportunity for snacking on some exotic deliciousness, and picked off the retreating ants one by one. The rest of the chickens followed, pecking away with glee.

Genghis, meanwhile, regarded me judgmentally.

“I know” I said. “I'm sure there are all sorts of proverbs about not poking a random lump with a stick, but I did, OK?”

He blinked. Really, for a rooster, he is ridiculously opinionated.

When I came inside I couldn’t help but feel I had ants on me. I was itchy. But as I was in the middle of a work thing, I decided it was just my imagination and I would ignore it Then an ant literally strolled across my screen as I was typing. I squealed, cursed, surrendered, and headed for the shower.

The undeniable truth is that when you poke an ant’s nest, you have to deal with the after-effects.

If I’m honest though, there are people who have almost the same effect on me. Not that they make me have to run to the shower, but that should I make the mistake of distractedly wandering into their world, I feel unsettled and squirrelly for ages afterwards. They’re not to be found in my backyard but one wrong click on a keyboard, or a phone, and they’re right in front of my eyes.

Marjorie Taylor Green. Jacob Rees Mogg. Though it’s not just limited to people with three names. There’s a whole slew of them.

The Say-Something-Repugnant-For-The-Sake-Of-It brigade. They're loud and brash with puffed-up indignation. They present as slightly different, but really they’re pretty much the same. Periodically squealing about getting canceled - though I can never understand why if they're ‘canceled’ I still get to hear about them all the bloody time.

One news article and my whole mood can change. It's ridiculous. And unreasonable.

Nature filled the planet with all sorts of different species. I don’t have to like all of them. And I don’t.

And frankly, if Nature had only bothered to bless Marjorie Taylor Greene with some discernible talent - like if she could play the guitar or something - the planet might be a much more peaceful place. Because then she’d have somewhere positive to place her insatiable need for attention.

Same goes for Jacob Rees Mogg. The opposite side of the Atlantic and completely the opposite social standing. But brought up in privilege with such a skewed sense of worth, yet with nothing of actual worth to say.

So all that remains for them both is to burble words of poison because being completely repellent is at least some form of memorable.

It must suck to be that needy. But I find it hard to have compassion. Because there’s so many of their type around. It’s overwhelming. They’re like ants.

Except they’re not at all like ants. Because I actually sort of respect ants (albeit from a distance.)

And also they're not like ants, because gardening publications don’t talk about ants the way that news organizations talk about The Say-Something-Repugnant-For-The-Sake-Of-It Brigade. If they did, nobody would ever go out.

Because every Gardening article would be about what the ants have done. And what the ants might plan to do next. There would be polls trying to prove that some people preferred ants to actual gardens and how it’s impossible to even think about looking towards the future because the ants are destined to take over the world.

Even though it’s absurd, there would be features about what it might be like inside the mind of an ant, even though that what exists inside there, is pretty much what was in the mind of the last ant.

Vitriol - the language of the weak. Bitterness - the language of the broken and bullying - the action of those who have no purpose at all.

After my shower, I went out into the backyard, with snacks for the chickens.

While the others pecked at the ground, Genghis eyed me suspiciously.

“The thing is, my feathery friend,” I said, “Poking an ants nest might have been a bit stupid. But if you could use a computer or a cellphone with those big roostery claws, you'd be impressed at the vast amounts of virtual ants nests I am careful to navigate round on a daily basis, in order to keep sane.”

He blinked.

“Sane -ish” I added.

He blinked again.

“Ok. Functioning.” I conceded

He ruffled his feathers, shuffled a bit and pecked at the ground. I held out a couple of sunflower seeds, and he gently pecked them from my hand. We were good.

I looked around at the backyard. The sun was out. Buds were in bloom. The rose I planted on Valentine's Day ( romantic) heaved a leafy sigh of relief, free from the insect attack.

There are ants in the backyard, no doubt about it. But I generally prefer my focus to be on the flowers.

Till next week

xo

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