Bioluminescent

I named this piece after a new word I just learned: Bioluminescent. The word’s a gum ball of a thing to get your mouth around, so I don’t recommend uttering it as a first thought out of your head in the morning. Wait ‘til at least you’ve brushed your teeth and loosened jaw muscles.

We used to call bioluminescent beetles with wings just plain ol’ lightning bugs; fireflies others would label ’em. It’s the phenomena of a species that sends off a sort of Morse code kind of flashing light signal to help intercept mates or predators in dark nights at places like here along Slab Creek. Apparently it’s an enzyme within the firefly that reacts with oxygen to chemically produce a glow that allows us folks to do away with night-lights this time of the season cuz we got a lot of oxygen down our way.

So, lo and behold was I surprised to find that we just missed World Firefly Day earlier this month. A parade could have been had, except I’m thinkin’ that Firefly Day is a misnomer. I’m sure they’ll be getting around to fixin’ the title when word gets out that there was no spotting to be done daytime so by next July 6-7 we’ll be redirected to black of night in order to be able to turn in our head-count to the Mass Audubon’s Firefly Watch data bank. We’ll beat all comers hands down; not only that, it’ll put Slab Creek on the map and increase our sales of compostable bumper stickers and T-shirts. We are a force for economic development down here in the shadow lands.

It was two years ago, on the second floor of the National Art Gallery in Ottawa where I came across a painting forever lodged in memory. It stood out in an exhibit because from a distance it appeared to be solid black in tone. Approaching it, the viewer is caught up in a theme that has captured human imagination for centuries—the night chase of fireflies. The painting, Trees (c1970), is by the Albertaborn William Kurelek (1927 -1977) and the image is of children running through a forest in the hours of darkness in pursuit of fireflies, capturing them in mason jars. I’ll bet you’ve tried it: a jar of lightning bugs to stare at until the march of mosquitoes made you cry uncle was better than most things right?

Kurelek was a complex man painting themes with disturbing religious and political overtones, but it was the fleeting scenes from his upbringing in a family of Ukrainian immigrants living in the west—northern lights, rainbows, sun eclipses and snowball weather— that he is more positively remembered for.

The fascination for the pursuit of fireflies is everywhere where the species exist, mostly in central and eastern North America with small pockets in the west. Recent awareness of their decline primarily due to sky glow, light trespass and glare—light pollution in its simplest description—is being addressed; that’s where the Audubon firefly watch comes in. You see the nocturnal creatures only live for two years, so finding a mate to produce larvae is timely; they need dark sky and for them being flooded with the glare of light is worse than us looking for lost car keys at the beach. The keys mean nothing when if you’re a firefly what’s at stake is bearing offspring and regeneration.

So, planning for the International Slab Creek Firefly Watch is getting under way in anticipation for next year’s event. Participants wearing black will parade in darkness with the odd piece of fluorescent tape marking the path. Hopefully that’ll work out. Bar and food truck to serve by candlelight; artists painting, poets reciting, bioluminescent sing songs all included. There will be bleachers for those who regrettably suffer from insomnia.

As we also will surely beat out Ripley’s record; it will have been our anthem whose lyrics we borrowed from a former hit tune that will spur us on into the night: “‘cuz I’d get a thousand hugs from ten thousand lightning bugs as they tried to teach me how to dance; a foxtrot above my head, a sock hop beneath my bed; the disco ball is just hanging by a thread.” See what I mean?

I’ll be sure to remind you beforehand because y’all gonna wanna be here. Bumper stickers included in the price of admission.