Catching Fireflies 101

Ten minutes here we go. Yesterday I caught fireflies for the first time ever in my life. I wanted to write a dedicated piece about the experience, but I don't know when I'd get to it. I' guess I'll do it now, no reason not to.

To catch fireflies you need two people; one person to catch 'em and on person to hold the jar that holds 'em. The second person has the harder job, I think, because the fireflies like to climb straight up and you got to shake or tap the jar until they fall off the walls. Then you can pop the top and dump the new bug in and carefully seal it to make sure you don't crush any sneakers that got by you.

First person is the firefly hunter and has to be able to see them when they aren't lit up. They move away from you if you approach too fast. From twenty feet away or so they dart left or right quickly, but if you calmly walk up to them you can catch them quite easily. The firefly's favored means of escape is to slowly and steadily fly straight up. All you do is walk to them and extend your hand under them and raise your hand, scooping them right out of the air. Than you gently close your hand so as not to crush them and go to person number two who taps the jar, pops the top while you open your hand and shake the firefly into the jar.

After you catch a bunch--we caught 50ish--you take the jar to the basement and turn out the lights to watch them light up the darkness. The 'fire' of these fireflies are a neon yellowish green, it really stands out. After your eyes have adjusted to the darkness of the basement you will find the light of a firefly is almost blinding. When they light up.

But between the intermittent neon flashes there is a time when the fireflies climb all over the inside of the jar while their butts aglow like little neon embers, it is really faint--like a distant star, if you look right at it sometimes you can't see it, but if you look away you can. In the darkness all you can see is the bug butts neon glow randomly walking around, sometimes together sometimes not, all over the place, like bioluminescent deep sea jellyfish drifting in twisting currents.

They looked like stars to me, stars twisting into galaxies, galaxies drifting across the cosmos with the occasional neon-supernova flash.

I wanted to take a picture or a video, to show people--you, friends, family, the world--this amazing thing. But the camera's back lit display polluted the darkness with its piercing light, drowning out the soft glow of the fireflies. I tried to cover it with my hand, and succeeded in trapping the light pollution, but the camera wasn't sensitive enough to catch those minuscule embers.

It reminded me of something my dad said to me once. He use to photograph lots of stuff until one day he suddenly stopped. Didn't even bring his camera to the family summer trips anymore. Now you can't even get him to take a picture. I asked him why.

He said, "I find that I focus on getting the picture just right, but overlook the experience, the people around me, all of it. When I get home and we are talking about our memories, It's like I wasn't there; my memories are of lining up the perfect shot. I decided it's better to see it with your eyes around the people you love than through a lens, oblivious." Or something like that. Ever since then it has been something that I am aware of, taking pictures or experiencing things fully.

After watching those bugs crawl around that jar in the darkness with my favorite person I felt really happy and thought I'd share it with you. I don't think I will ever forget those little guys crawling around the inside of the jar in the darkness.

After we were done we let them go. Outside we popped the top off the jar.

I wanted them to escape from the jar in a geyser of neon yellow lights like a violent quasar, happy to be free and fill the night with their fire.

But they climbed to the top and took flight one by one--no swarm, no geyser, no lighting up. Simply flying away into the night, invisible. Somehow, it was better that way.