G R E E N P R I N T S

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The Miracle of the LadybugPoor thing? Not so fast!

Story and art by Hannah England

s I was sewing in my room the other night, I heard an insect repeatedly flying into the overhead light. I was trying, unsuccessfully, to ignore the annoying tapping—when the tink-tink of bug on glass abruptly

stopped. I looked. The bug was on the ground.I saw that it was a ladybug and that it wasn’t moving, so I

figured it had probably knocked itself out. Just in case it woke up and decided to resume ramming the light, I grabbed a nearby Tupperware container, removed the scraps of string that were inside, and placed it on top of the motionless ladybug. The longer

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I looked at it, the more I felt like it looked . . . dead. It died. It hit the light too hard and died.

Poor thing.It was past my bedtime at that point, and I didn’t want to go

aaaaaaall the way down the stairs to toss it out into the flowerbed, so I left it where it was. The next day I forgot all about it until I got home from work and spotted the Tupperware on the floor at the end of my bed. The ladybug was still under the Tupperware and still dead. It turns out I was also still too lazy to go down a flight of stairs to take it out, so it stayed there another night.

The next morning, this morning, I acci-dentally knocked the Tupperware over with my foot, and thought, “Ah, yes, the ladybug! I should really toss that outside,” but in my early morning, pre-work rush, I again failed to take it out. All I managed to do was pick the ladybug up and set it respectfully in the Tupperware so I wouldn’t accidentally step on it.

When I got home tonight, I finally de-cided to stop being lazy and throw the poor dead thing out. The ladybug was still in the Tupperware . . . CRAWLING AROUND.

It was dead. It rose on the third day. It is the Jesus of ladybugs. I quickly took it outside and gently set it on my flowerbed.Dear little ladybug, will you please help bring my garden back

to life, too? v

The longerI looked at

it, the moreI felt like

it looked . . . dead.

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