The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every morning, but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life.
The thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun, and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon.
It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. (paragraph breaks added)
Source: Orthodoxy, GK Chesterton
I don’t care for them either. Even birds don’t eat them. The word itself has a nasty, sandpapery sound to it. But…they do serve to keep other pests away, so I am told. There’s your positive…you don’t want to be stingy with positives, even concerning wasps.
Ian – You got me to wondering what would eat a wasp. A few (cautious) birds, apparently, some amphibians and reptiles, and other insects (like dragonflies, hurray!). It is a sad thing to be celebrated for your predators.
I don’t normally sign petitions, but if there is one for “Don’t like wasps” I’d be sorely tempted to sign it.
Tom
Tom – Yes, with about as much effect as many other petitions. Every time I fly across this great land, I’m tempted to launch a petition to scrunch it.
I’m no fan of the wasp either so I have to admit that the photos and accompanying comments gave me a guilty twinge of pleasure. Does that count as a positive?
Anne – That’s a conundrum, as is the problem of how to count anyone who reads your admission and feels good about themselves because they didn’t have that thought, while discounting any guilt they feel for feeling superior on that account if indeed, they did so feel. This is getting pretty complicated, which is another negative to ascribe to the wasp, I feel.
And then there’s the Costa Rican President who calmly swallows a wasp while talking to reporters a couple of days ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L2O1-_fe7E
Marilyn – That’s sort of endearing. He tries to carry on as if nothing had happened, and then gives in to the moment and laughs. Thanks!
I used to think of wasps as an unpleasantness smart people simply avoided. Dad pointed out their flight paths at the cottage so we could avoid them. He dealt with the wasps’ nests at night by flashlight, stunning them with smoke before carefully crushing the nest and its inhabitants. Those were the days before Raid made the job easier, if more toxic. Years later, while looking into a shed window I was stung on the lip repeatedly and was so shocked — not to mention pained — that I burst into tears. I am not one to cry easily. It seems I had blocked a wasp highway through that window. My tolerance for wasps slipped a few notches. Then, last year, one of our grandchildren went into moderately dangerous anaphylactic shock following a wasp sting. Those little varmints can kill. If I encounter them now I am ruthless. Yet, I do admire your photos!
Laurna – As a child I had a big reaction to a wasp sting – not anaphylactic but a painful, huge lump. We just put some mud on it and moved on. Now I’d dose it with antihistamine or something similar. I wonder how many people died of similar stings without anyone ever knowing what the heck it was? I’m glad your grandchild wasn’t one of those.
I’m late coming into this discussion, but it seems to me that the thing about wasps is the guilt-by-association complex. Wasps sting, and I have no hesitation in zapping them with pesticides. But I see people who carry that fear (and loathing) over to honeybees and bumblebees. Bumblebees are amazingly tolerant creatures; they rarely sting. Honeybees clustered on our lavender blossoms will leave me alone as long as I leave them alone; they’re utterly devoted to their work.
Jim T
Jim T – I wonder if the fear of honeybees is fed by the cartoon image of them swarming out to defend their hive. But I have no clear categories of bees in my head (although I have some fabulous photos to be shared at a later date).