AFTERMATH: Moths

Hello, you might already know that the first 22 episodes of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (Jan to April 2013).  You can also buy it on amazon, if you don't mind their tax arrangements, that is.  From that point on, the blog is my daily musings on a theme of addiction and recovery (not that I really like those words, but what can you do, sometimes you just have to use the tools in the box).  And here are today's spanners in the works...

MOTHS

I wonder if moths have a problem.

They sleep in the day, then spend the night chasing the moon and orbiting light-bulbs.  Has no one told them things wouldn't be so desperate if they just got up with the rest of us?  I use the term 'us' loosely.

But we, who've hovered in hovels with many a moth, have seen the difference within the generality.  It may seem their lives are all the same, flitting about in stairwells and porches, hurling themselves at whatever glow's on offer, as if that'll make everything ok.

But no two moths can occupy the same space at the same time.  They may be hurtling towards the same light-bulb, but from different angles, and their gossamer pilgrimage there will be defined by the competition around them, those other flapping nocturnes who want a piece of it too.  Maybe some will become allies, but surely, in the chaos of clashing wings and antennae, it's a bit like when a lone food-drop lands in the middle of a famine.  Suddenly friends become enemies, commonality turns to competition and commerce.

Then, along comes the caretaker, doing his rounds, and the corridor goes dark.  Bewilderment and panic set in, as spirals, like tiring tornados, begin to unravel and unspool, and feelers are put out for news of a nearby light that might see us through the night.

But if there isn't one, it's flap around in the half-light, scavenging on a shaft of streetlight that's spilling through a window, like a taunt, like at the end of Bullseye, when, having not won the jackpot, you're nevertheless shown 'what you could have won'.

And there's nothing worse than walking into a hallway, full of angry moths.  Some will still be flapping about, limping through the air like bitter geriatrics, others will still be throwing themselves at the glass, hoping for an opening, whilst others will have adhered themselves to the wall, waiting for better times, wishing they'd been born a butterfly.

And that is the end of today's sermon.