The two months I spent working as a Field Technician, hunting and trying to kill mosquitoes, is something I have been anxiously waiting to share with all of you. Quite the adventure through the freshwater woods and salt marshes of New Hampshire. I learned that I am not the killer I hoped to be. I also am not “un-allergic” to poison-ivy.   My final straw was the day I was told to go straight into thick down-ward sloping poison-ivy brambles. I was carrying a 50-pound pack and ended up falling face-first right into it. Car died on the drive home on the side of the highway and the next day I woke with a slash of red on my face (right cheek) and the worst of the poison-ivy rash right between my first and second fingers on my writing hand (right). Oh more importantly, the tow-truck driver never towed my car home so I had no way to get to work. (I had to abandon the car on the side of the highway because my windows were stuck rolled down and the mosquitoes I had been trying to kill all day were biting me just out of reach on my shoulder blades.) What a couple of months it has been. But let me back-up.

When the Corona Virus hit I was still working 3 jobs-2 of which were in a different state. I was prep-cooking at a cafe and a wedding venue and nannying for a family an hour and a half away. All three of these jobs put me on furlough–lucky for me. Cut to two months later, I am going bananas/stir-crazy, lapping my apartment building 80 times a day just to try and keep my restless leg syndrome in check and from accidentally kicking myself to the moon.

Needless to say, I was ready to get back to work. I was thrilled when I ever saw the “wetland warrior” ad on indeed. “I can do that”, my macho mind told itself…”easy peasy lemon-squeezy”, my mind retorted with glee. Well easy was it? Not it was! I literally almost gave myself heat-stroke and passed out in the thick, unforgiving, stain-making mud of the marsh. I am half-surprised but also somewhat certain part of my ego was left somewhere back in that mud. The part that cares that it’s aging and the fact that I recently turned 40 is making this job harder than I anticipated. For one, the slight vertigo I feel when I lay down after a day on the mosquito trails was one dead give-away. The falls over slippery roots and trips over leg-winding weeds and saplings was another.

The daily blessings nature provided me though are enough for an entire book of newborn poems. (Soon to come and be shared with all of you at Elephant).  So many odes to all-stages of frog-life. So many short-stories to come. Something called from Tadpoles to Toadettes perhaps.  Well, you know what I mean. I saw dragonflies every day all day. Dragonflies for Days another possibility.  Views to hang onto or that are worthy of being hung on the castle walls of Rome. Father time. Yes I saw him too. I thought about how Father Time has been trying to tell me something as of late…”You have got to be slowing down now. Stop ignoring what is inside of you” Then my car died. Then I lost my job and here I sit, writing this down to share with you what is inside. This incredible need to write. Live. Love. Write. Repeat.