[See Yellow Jacket Invasion Part 1 for the first part of this story.]
A month into our home ownership gig, it seemed like Daniel and I were losing: Calamities 2; Daniel and Stephanie Team 0. First there was the flood of epic proportions; now the yellow jackets. We were certainly learning a lot, and we were wrangling our house into a home, but we would be content to stop the plagues at two.
Meanwhile, I was grateful to be on the other side of the glass while the beekeeper worked his disappearing act on two hundred-some yellow jackets.
Daniel and I stood safely outside with our noses pressed to the window while our apian hero vacuumed up hundreds of the stinging little monsters and removed chunk after chunk of the yellow jacket nest. I’m pretty sure I counted to six football-sized pieces before I blacked out.
An hour or so into the removal process, I’d seen all I needed to see. Now that the initial shock had worn off, I was starting to get fidgety as the daylight ticked away and no progress was being made on my to-do list. Vacuum the carpet—nope, couldn’t do that right now. Clean the bathrooms—also an inside job. Shoot, even the to-do list was inside.
The only thing I could do was sit on the back porch. And sit.
Taking the Sting Out
We’d put up a hummingbird bird feeder the day before, but so far the birds had been a little skittish about dropping by. We’d
seen a few of them take a sip, drive-thru style, but none of them had stopped to perch.
I admired the birds’ beauty and delicate wings, but it made me weary to see them flittering and skittering, never pausing to rest. Don’t you guys need to gear up for a super-long migration to Mexico? I asked them silently as they flitted by. We provided this rest stop just for you, with homemade food and everything. Don’t you want to stop and rest for a while?
And then the irony hit me with such force that I laughed at loud. “Okay, God, I get it.”
Ceasing Our Fluttering
It was the Sabbath, and I’d been flitting around like a little hummingbird all day long. Lots of motion . . . but for what?
God seemed to be telling me, not so subtly, that there was nothing else to do in that moment except sit rest. It was time to forget about my to-do list for a while and embrace the rest he was giving me (forcing on me?) on that sacred day. The vacuuming could wait. The to-do list could wait. For now, my job number one was to sit and enjoy the world he’d made. Hummingbirds and yellow jackets included.
In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.
—Leo Tolstoy
***
In case you’re wondering, the yellow jackets were all taken care of, and I didn’t see another one until the next morning, when Daniel donned his yellow cycling jersey (an odd choice for professional work attire, I thought). He kept looking at me expectantly after he got dressed, as if waiting for me to catch a punch line.
Finally it hit me: sure enough, it was another yellow jacket.
