The Fort-maker on a Rainy Day

 

Looking at the blisters on your hands as you slog out and feel like carrying the burden of the whole existence? Wait! Everything and everyone from the mightiest to the lowest is entitled to this feeling. We are doing things because rest of others are also busy with the same tons of sweat. Problem is we put too much of pondering over even the smallest of things that must be simply followed in a natural sequence. It saves energy for the pleasant aesthetics of life. Love and consideration are simply flowers in the garden of aesthetic sense.

I see a fort-maker on a rainy day, and all my extra sense of being a tireless worker scampers off. It has all the fundamentals of making a big human fort on the hilltop. Watching it I get to realize how endowed we humans are as a part of society and civilization, where our collective self guarantees so many entitlements and conveniences. A tiny insect on the other hand braves it all alone. It makes me feel protected and pampered. I feel gratitude. And gratitude is the loving buddy of your compassionate self.

Existence weaves the web of creation with endless patience and infinite diligence. Both are same by the way, not contradictory.

It's hot and humid, the sun sweltering over rain-lashed earth. There is a well-digger in my yard, sweating it out since early morning. The sand-wasp works more efficiently than a human earth-mover. No noise, no pollution. Simply going in and coming out in reverse with a sand-ball tucked between its snout and the foreleg pair that it uses with the efficiency of hands. And freshly hued damp yellow sand growing up like a tiny mound. It appears as a hill of its efforts. 

It's unmindful of me taking a picture from a close quarter. Given its single-minded focus, I wonder I may have a tiny hill and a spring—because water table is very high in rainy season—in my yard. Best of luck well-digger! But please don't dig too deep to make a hole for a small snake to fit in.

On further enquiries I find it's a friendly insect, doesn't aggressively bite like bees. Now I see why it's unmindful of my presence so near its sandy altar. It also preys upon mosquitoes and houseflies. So continue bro, dig a long tunnel for your larvae and then prey upon our common enemies. In full support with you! Cheers!

Now I see it closing the gates of its fort, for new life, new cycle. While closing the gates, it takes a few breakfasty bites at a couple of ants also. Possibly it has missed breakfast today. After closing the gates, it hovers over the mound with the elated buzz of a triumphant US military hawk helicopter. The fort-maker then scraps a depression around the freshly dug cave-mouth to close it temporarily. Possibly it is meant to, I am not sure, guard the site during its absence. It is then gone for the time. Not to loiter around, I am sure. There is something in store in its scheme, which I cannot understand at the moment.

And I am proven right. It's never chalta hai attitude in nature, unlike humans who take shortcuts and apartments and bridges collapse. The sand-wasp went out to get some preys that it collects nearby under the windfallen leaves. To keep its hole safe and guarded in its absence, it puts up a temporary earthwork by its opening. Coming back, it removes the part-time gate and gets into business again. It will lay eggs and leave food there. The larvae will eat, grow big and pop out into the world.

So that turns out to be its modus operandi: closing the fortress temporarily, digging an oblong depression around the opening, leaving the scene, and come back again after a couple of hours to start the task again.

In the afternoon it rains cats and dogs. A furious rainstorm jolts even robust farmers and big trees. After the storm I see the site lashed by rains, the small depression around the opening filled with sand and the sand mound washed away. I think it is over. In such a stormy blizzard, the little insect must have been blown away to a far place, I guess. Or most probably it is even dead.

However, the tough taskmaster shows that it is still around despite the storm. Back to business after the floods! The next day, I see again the trademark little depression around the hole’s mouth and gates temporarily shut. Well done! You teach me a big lesson in perseverance. I feel humble, and feel that everyone out there is doing his/her duties. A stone is lifted off my heart. It feels light. It then soars high to draw big swigs of happiness and contentment.

Isn’t everything around perspiring to pursue its destiny? So don’t feel burdened unnecessarily because that’s how things are all around.