When I was a child, I often felt like the Peanuts character Pig Pen, the little kid who walked around with a cloud of buzzing insects surrounding him. Whatever pheromones I give off, I am irresistible to biting, stinging, flying creatures. I suspect that the same mechanism is at work when I attract the lowest-life reprobate losers in airport bars. And you wonder why I hate to fly. But that is a story for another post...
In NY, I actually ended up in the hospital several times the first year after we moved there, during "black fly" season. Black flies are a peculiar type of "no-see-um," also known in historical literature as The Scourge of the Adirondacks. There are early recorded accounts of explorers, trappers, hunters and voyageurs being driven mad by swarms of the biting insects. For about 6 weeks in early summer, I had to stay indoors (not an option), wear a bee-keeper's hood whenever I did go outside (yes, people pointed and laughed at the Little League field), take baths in Off! before any outdoor social event, and suffer the indignity of explaining that my fat jaw, lumpy arms or swollen-shut eyes were not the result of spousal abuse, but an allergic reaction to a bite I never realized I had gotten while I was walking to the garage.
Whatever Tennessee creature is feasting on me now, I will have to remember to take more major precautions in the future, whenever I venture outdoors. Why do I have to keep learning this? You'd think that I'd figure it out after a lifetime of sensitivity. You'd think that as soon as the weather warmed, I'd be spraying myself down and carrying that green can with me wherever I went. Middle-aged memory loss? Stubbornness? Hope?
In the meantime, I itch. I have 8 bites on each thigh (ah! symmetry!), 10 on my back, 12 on my stomach (including one inside my belly-button!) 6 on my caboose, a dozen or so behind each knee, and a particularly odd one in my right armpit. It is strange that this one itches the most, in a place where I have no feeling because of the surgical scars. How is it possible to feel an itch when all else is numb? It is a mystery.
I've tried it all, of course. Benadryl, Calamine, Ivy-Dry, Aveno, alcohol, peroxide, baking soda, vinegar, nail polish, ice, ad nauseum. The only thing to do is to try mightily to avoid scratching (but it feels so good!) and wait for it to go away.
1 comment:
Haven't we traveled this path before? I'm trying so hard to NOT laugh at the picture of the previous you during bug seasons. I will tell you that I, too, am a target for the hated black flies & as soon as I go out they go for my head so not even if it is darkish - yes, they are still out there - I wear my sun bonnet & that helps and if it doesn't, I remove it and smack the crap out of them with it. Try one of the sting sticks or hydracordisone.....oatmeal bath anyone?
Maybe it won't last long - BUT PLEASE don't forget about how the bugs love you here, my friend.
L, M ;-)
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