SMARTY PANTS

365 Days of Thanksliving — Day 282

So, (big sigh)… because planning ahead and actually taking meat out of the freezer is apparently beyond us, we ventured out for a bite to eat. After throwing money at our hunger, we stopped at the grocery store, then aimed the Kia for home. And that’s when we hit it: a massive swarm of dragonflies.

How’s that for a spellbinding opener? I know, try to contain your excitement. Hahaha!!!

Honestly, I’d never seen anything like it. While trying to keep the car on the road—because, yes, my genius reflex was to try and physically swerve around bugs in a moving vehicle—I kept thinking of the biblical plague of locusts. Please God, I thought, let's skip the Old Testament wrath tonight.

I just learned this weekend that a legit plague of locusts invaded the upper Midwest in the late 1800s. From the way it sounded, it was on a biblical scale. Our Minnesota ancestors lost everything, some literally down to the shirts on their backs. (Because apparently, locusts eat cotton blends, too.)

Anywho… I’ve never seen so many of these things at once. They were literally zinging around in kamikaze formations, aggressively aiming for the windshield like they had a vendetta. After pulling into the driveway without going into a ditch, I texted a few friends to get the 411 on the bugs. I figured they were smarter than me on things like this. Let's be honest, lots of things, really.

No sooner did I ask than Facebook, creepy as always, served me a post about dragonfly migration. Me, a total science dummy, had absolutely zero clue insects migrated. Being curious, I asked AI about it, and Gemini spit out an encyclopedia-length answer. Kinda fascinating, if you ask me (which you definitely didn’t).

Apparently, these bugs run on a three-generation relay race. Wave one flies north in year one, plants eggs, and promptly dies. What a glamorous life, right? Then their babies hatch, grow, and fly south to the tropics. Once they arrive, they gorge themselves, make their own babies, and then croak just like mom and dad. (Frankly, I’d die too if I had to flap my wings for thousands of miles nonstop.) Then generation three decides they aren't suckers. They say, "Nah, we’re just gonna stay right here in the sun." They eat, party, plant their eggies, and croak. Cycle repeats. Who knew?

Well, apparently my buddy Shawn knew, as did Google Gemini (which obviously knows everything, and definitely knows too much about all of us), and a few other brainiacs.

In any event, tonight I’m thankful there are plenty of people out there significantly smarter than me on a whole library of issues. The world is full of smarty-pants, and for that, I’m genuinely grateful. We need the brain surgeons, the rocket scientists, the engineers, the farmers, and everyone in between to keep this circus running.

God wired us all differently for a reason. We’re all good at something, and together, we somehow keep society from totally collapsing. I’m grateful for that, even if it took dodging a plague of migrating dragonflies to remember it.

What are you thankful for tonight? (If you say "bugs," we can't be friends). I’ll catch ya on the flipside, my friends.