The Butterfly

I have so many things to write about the house, but none of them are particularly inspiring. So, per the urging of a friend of mine, I am sharing with those few of you who still read this blog a little story I related to her regarding my journey home yesterday.

I was riding the metro home, lodged in my turbulent head, feeling like crap (ill, old, wondering what it's all for), when my eyes happened upon the most beautiful butterfly resting on the very bottom of the divider by one of the doors. This was around Pentagon station. Despite the stops, no one else seemed to notice this majestic yellow and black bit of fauna that had inexplicably left its more appropriate context for this industrial world. And, as it didn't once flap its wings or move the slightest bit despite the shuffling on and off of the passengers, I thought it might well be dead.

As we approached my station, I got up and walked over to the butterfly and just as the train stopped, bent down to see if it was alive and to try to take it off of the train. As I gently reached out my fingers, suddenly up and away it flitted, and a frantic effort to catch or direct the butterfly off the train ensued. There I was, chasing a butterfly about the train car, trying to get both of us off before the doors closed. And everyone's sullen spaced-out faces suddenly came alive with the surprise adventure playing out before them and I could feel the collected hush and tension - everyone rooting for me to help this poor creature escape, while also thinking I was slightly batty. There were oooos and finally ohhhs as the butterfly miraculously latched itself onto my waist and I was able to dart out the doors just before they closed.

And there the butterfly remained as I walked home trying to shelter it from the wind, past the quizzical stares and smiles of passing strangers. It was a little ragged at the bottom of its wings, and clung to me all the way to the house. I thought it might be at the end of its life and just couldn't bear to think of this beautiful creature dying alone on a subway car. So I transferred it to our tomato plant in the hope that it might eat something (not knowing, exactly what butterflies eat, but having seen some in the zoo eating fruit). I went out an hour later and it hadn't moved and as I was terrified that it would be knocked from the leaves by the wind, we plucked the leaf it sat on and placed it on the more sheltered lavender cotton plant, which is closer to a patch of moss, so that should its end be nigh, it would not drop down onto a ragged concrete sidewalk but onto a soft green space as would be more appropriate.

This morning I went out, holding my breath, but the butterfly had flown away.