For the record, today’s post for the A-Z Challenge in honor of the letter ” B” was going to be about bicycles. It was going to be about my sweet new bike that I was going to get and how I’ve been obsessing over getting a bicycle for the past few weeks and researching, and dreaming of the perfect bike….

I was going to make a clever statement about how I haven’t ridden a bike in 10 years but I hear it’s just like riding a bike….

 

 

It was to be a glorious post about my new bike.

But alas, I didn’t get a new bike (for myself) today. It wasn’t the droids I was looking for. I mean it wasn’t the bike I was looking for.

What I did see, which reminded me of what is just around the corner, was a big fat, low flying, likely drunk, bumblebee.

No, it was WAAAY scarier than whatever the hell THAT is. Although that IS disturbing.

No folks, I mean a real bumblebee. The ones that fly with no rhyme or reason and you’re 100% sure they’re going to crash into you.

It’s like that awkward moment when you and a fellow human are about to walk into each other and one of you goes towards the right while the other person goes to their left (your right), and so on for two or three rounds of uncomfortable until one of you understands that someone needs to stand still for the other person to make a move so that you can actually break free of what turns into a full 10 seconds of pure awkwardness.

Only the bumblebee NEVER FEELS AWKWARD and continues until it’s chased you into the street with its inability to heed to your next move and you’re backed into oncoming traffic and hit by a semi-truck and the bumblebee steals your identity and starts sleeping with your wife and/or husband and decides to paint your car yellow. It won’t matter though. Because you’ll be dead.

Such is the way of the bumblebee.

It’s the sign that marks the beginning of spring and bee season. The time of year, in Stockholm, where we put away the winter coat and winter boots and take out the just less than winter coat and only partially fur-lined boots. It’s a time when it might be below zero (celsius) and 2 hours later, be a balmy 10 degrees (celsius), followed by a snow flurry, and then back up to 18 (celsius).

This is a high anxiety time of the year for me, because….

I have an irrational, and near paralyzing, ridiculous fear of bees.

Except for the paralyzing part.

If I so much as HEAR the slightest buzz, you’re in for a treat. I have over sensitive hearing, and even if it’s the tiny humming buzz of a mosquito, it is ON.

I’m not entirely sure where this deep seeded full on panic attack from a small black and yellow insect comes from…oh and by the way, it’s best to mention now that be it a bumblebee, a wasp, a hornet, a honey bee, or…I’ll be honest now, any flying insect in general up to and including flies, butterflies and moths, they all end in the same result. Me dropping absolutely everything, and running away like a complete moron.

There is no avoiding this.

It will happen every year..until they hibernate or fly south or whatever the hell they do for, what is luckily, a long winter.

And yes, I get it, we need bees and flies and blah blah blah for the environment.

I’m not saying kill them.

I’m saying, “Oi! You. Yeah you there.. flying insects…YES, all of you, even the butterflies. Yeah, it’d be great if you could not fly all up in my grill, mmmmkay? You go ahead and do your thing, and I’ll do mine. Let’s just coexist without you insisting on flying in my face or past my ear, or, my personal favorite, chasing me as I run away from you in what is surely nothing less than a mocking fashion. There’s enough space for both of us. So come on, brah.” (I imagine they’re all cool with being called, brah.)

For the record, it’s basically all bugs and insects. Spiders, worms, grasshoppers, those stick bugs, beetles… ALL OF THEM.

And so it begins…the season of terror.

B is for Bees. 

Anyone else here relating?