1 Mother 2 Another

There’s something about becoming a
mother that makes you feel responsible for, well, the entire
universe. I spent one entry about a week ago linking to therapeutic
blogs to help work through this, so I’m not going to dwell on
the rightness or wrongness here.


I’m just going to acknowledge that it exists.


Once you become a mother, you see every single child out there as,
to some extent, your own. From very early on, I found myself trying
to help out frustrated toddlers on a playground, or cautioning
complete strangers that they were doing something dangerous
(“Do you think your Mommy would let you cross the street
blindfolded?”) Just last week I spent a lovely evening with
an author friend of mine, attending his book signing and just being
a fly on the wall. Once we left the gathering and were walking
towards the parking lot, he looked bemusedly at me as I grabbed his
hands and proceeded to squirt – uninvited – hand
sanitizer on them.


“You don’t know where all those hands you shook have
been, and it’s a long book tour and you need to be healthy.
Rub your hands together for as long as it takes to sing
‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ and don’t give me
any grief about this,” I said, half ashamed and half defiant
and wholly unable to stop myself.


So I guess it’s no wonder I’ve begun to feel
responsible for the animals in our side yard.

As I mentioned last week, we have –
well, had (spoiler alert!) – ten caterpillars in our side
garden, busily eating my dill plant as they prepared to cocoon.
Every time I saw my gigantic dill plant getting smaller, I simply
shrugged and said, smiling, “Hey, we never eat all our dill
anyway – I’m sure there will be plenty left
over.”


I underestimated how much ten caterpillars can eat.


Sunday morning we went outside and saw the plant, completely
denuded and bitten down to the stubs. Of the ten original
caterpillars, only four were still stubbornly gnawing at the
remains. The other six had made a break for it, in search of
further sustenance. I spied one caterpillar on the neighboring
basil plant and didn’t take time to look for the others; I
simply ran out to buy another dill plant. I know, you see, that
most caterpillars only eat one or two types of plants at the most
– who knew if they’d find something else edible in the
nursery – er, garden?


Well, apparently dill-starting season is past, for there was nary a
dill plant to be found. Thinking about how we’d found one on
the basil, I quickly bought another one – heaven knows our
current two basil plants wouldn’t last them half an hour
– and hurried home.


By the time I got back, there were only two caterpillars left on
the dill. I looked around and spied a less-than-alive one in the
no-man’s land under a bench: a veritable wasteland of dry
Texas dirt, no weeds or plants or anything to feed a Very Hungry
Caterpillar.

He’d chosen the wrong direction in
which to explore.


Almost in tears, I picked him up anyway and set him inside the
lavender, where I found another caterpillar. Yes! So perhaps they
like lavender? I went inside to tell the girls.


Cora came back out with me to see what was going on, and to help
with the rescue effort. With her help, we found one in the oregano,
one in the cilantro, and two poor valiant souls on the walking
path, still alive but liable to be trampled at any moment. We
carefully picked them up and set them in the oregano and cilantro,
by now simply swinging wildly and hoping we’d come up with
SOMETHING else they’d like to eat.


Of the last two caterpillars, we saw no sign, even though we
searched assiduously. Cora, ever the pragmatic, finally said,
“I’m guessing birds found them and ate them. At least
they’re moving up the food chain.”


I found myself coming back to the side garden over and over
yesterday, worrying and hovering like the worst kind of helicopter
parent. They’re just silly caterpillars, I know. But I
invited them to my garden with my irresistible dill, and then
didn’t provide enough for them to stay alive. I made
promises, built up false hope, and then didn’t provide for
them, didn’t keep them safe.


In short, I’m a bad mother.


If only I knew what kind of plants they eat, I’d fix
everything. If only I knew how close they are to cocooning,
I’d know if I should move them or leave them be where they
are. But I don’t have enough information and don’t have
enough control over the situation and I feel like I’m letting
them down.


I know it’s not just me: I saw my mom sneaking repeatedly
outside to “check on things” and see if she could help
rearrange them some way. At one point she came to me, a live
caterpillar in her hand, and said, “I found this one on the
steps into the house. Do you think it was coming in to ask us for
help?” Then, to the little guy, “TELL ME WHAT YOU EAT!
AND WE WILL HELP YOU! I CAN’T FIX IT IF I DON’T KNOW
WHAT’S WRONG!”


Once a mother, always a mother.