ants and life
this is a ramble/story/self-indulgent personal therapy session, just as a warning
--
i killed 300 ants today. it happened at the end of a day where nothing happened, and i feel sick and strange about it.
i woke up after staying up until 3am, and purposefully missed a personal morning meeting. i got out of bed at noon and tiptoed out of my room and into the kitchen to heat up some lunch meal prep. i don't remember what i talked about or how i was feeling, but i ate in my room. i put the box aside and finished up some soft work on some projects and ended early. i don't remember what i did for the next 5 hours.
i watched 2 movies afterwards, and after finishing up the second, i walked over to the chair across from my bed which had a crudely rolled up closed-open package of white cheddar popcorn. i would have eaten and finished the bag of popcorn while watching something else if not for the fact that there were no less than at least 200, 300 ants that i discovered in, around, outside, down the leg of the chair, across the carpet into a crack in the corner of the closet, forming a thick, dark, amorphous line hurriedly vibrating in order to feed their entire colony. i stared at it for 2 minutes.
the bag of popcorn, also tangentially connected to an open box of cereal, was available for 2 days. we had had ant problems this past month at our house, and as wetter weather came back temporarily, small groups came in and out at various times. this was obviously, at this point, the largest epicenter of it all. i quickly tiptoed out of my room and got the ant spray and with 2 short deep breaths, i moved in. i coated the bag, the box, the cushion, the leg, the black line in the carpet and inside the crevice, and sat down on the floor and stared for 15 minutes.
i got a trash bag and nervously placed the bag and box inside, wiped down the chair and spot swiped the black line with multiple tissues and paper towels. i threw out the trash while simultaneously taking the bins in. it was midnight and it was cold. i washed some dishes in the kitchen and made myself some tea. and i'm here.
--
so what's the point of saying any of this. this could be easily boiled down to a moderately disturbing story said in passing, with everyone moving on in 5 minutes or less. but here's the catch, that entire situation was a callout. it was a confrontational event that laid into all of the insecurities and anxieties that have been bubbling underneath the surface. it was, is, could be, an omen.
i've been scared. for a lot of my life, i've retreated into a safe and familiar internal utopia, that always develops and entertains, that comforts and soothes, that rewards and rewinds again and again. externally, i've been allowed by both myself and others to continue feeding this place, to continue to deny and ignore the grounded, concrete world around me in favor of the constructed fantasy of my brain. it's easier to live in something you've built than to live in something you adapt to.
passive neglect has been the norm. there has always been this continual denial of reality, because existing in that space, a space that is uncontrolled, unpredictable, and uncomfortable in so many terrifying ways, feels unsustainable. reality has had this imposing reputation that refuses to budge in my head, and the magic wand to escape via autopilot survival mode becomes the default. written code in my brain, buried deep down into the grooves. rejecting delusion would be rewriting my core instinct of which i base my entire foundation on. but it is a choice, every time, whether it stems from me or others, whether i'm aware of it or not, and it's the source of so much self-loathing. so much numbing and ignoring and avoiding and pretending.
i'm staring at this crime scene, seeing the result of 300 ants trying to survive with the ideal conditions that they found out purely out of chance. it wasn't a good or bad thing, it just was. they had justifiably taken advantage of that particularly depressive passive neglect, but with that came the chilling sensation of enacting the same detached mentality required to murder. there was no option, not anymore. once again, neglect had led me to a silent yet screaming consequence. it isn't just annoying, or gross, or cringy, or whatever. it means something real because this situation was presented with neutral open hands. the universe pointed at me, challenged me with a bright spotlight, and i'm forced to open my eyes and deal with it, and all of its mess. and that is the reality of existence. that is what it means to exist in reality. it's messy and weird and confusing and curious and frustrating and thrilling and scary and funny and complicated. it's everything, and there is no guarantee on anything other than the fact that we'll die. that it could be swift or prolonged, accidental or purposeful. that you could find security and be abruptly met with death, and that life moves on, for millions and billions of years. so if that's the end, in all of its microscopic insignificance, why do i decide to spend these unpredictable moments in denial? what would it actually be like to choose new, and would it really be a nightmare? if life is already moving forward past us, could we spend it trying to connect, trying to enrich the small amount of time we have, trying to share our collective fear rather than carry it alone? could we laugh at the absurdity of the situation, and move with whatever comes with it?
why am i starting to well up with regret and relief? what if i chose to be here, in all of its messiness? what if i tried, just tried, now?
--
thanks for reading, i don't know why but i really had to write this. maybe there was a moment of abstract connection or maybe it's just a vacuum, i don't know but i definitely won't leave food out like that again. also my tea is cold.