jollyelmroot

I really like butterflies, a lot. I really really like them. I love how they flutter midair. I love how gracefully they flap their wings. I adore their iridescent patterns, and I especially love when they stick out their long tongues.

I remember when I was little, I was on the porch in my home and I had planned on intentionally catching a butterfly, so I had got honey and placed it on my finger, and I remember a cabbage butterfly coming along, it landed on my finger that had a dime size of honey. I kept that creature all day, feeding it honey. Night had fallen and I had a took the butterfly inside I placed it on a pillow and layer on the floor in the living room with my Barbie dolls.

Fear had fallen me because I noticed my little friend had stopped moving, I poked it and it started moving and then I left it alone for bit but I got worried again and poked it and it moved a bit again.

In my mind I thought that this butterfly had died or was dying so I did what I thought best. Why don’t I bring this butterfly back outside onto my porch. I went to sleep that night of course and awoke and checked the back porch and the butterfly was gone.

I guess it had flew away.

I’ve been catching butterflies since kindergarten, they were my main companions in recess and I would hop and jump all over the grass catching mainly cabbage butterflies, along with other insects but I mainly liked butterflies. If I couldn’t successfully catch a butterfly I would catch a moth as they were easier to tag. Catching butterflies felt like a game of tag because I would pounce on the ground only to see that I missed the butterfly and it would simply land on a dandelion and I would pounce again and BAM I tagged it after a long while and when I’m done the butterfly flutters away and the game is done.

I’m bigger now, and catching butterflies were a thing of the past, just a childhood leisure or at least I thought so.

One day I went to Central Park, awaiting the time to pick up my sibling, I notice a large patch of flowers and saw so many monarch butterflies flying around and the urge grew. I looked at these butterflies and remembered what I used to do when I was little. My hand slowly and discreetly rose above and behind the monarch. Then quickly I delicately lifted the butterfly off from the pink flower and SNAPPED! Of course I had to take a picture, it was my first catch of a monarch! Every time I would go to Central Park I would always keep my eyes out for butterflies and honestly I didn’t care if anyone saw. I wanted to experience that nostalgia again.

I would stand near flowers and wait for the butterflies to land, I watch admiring their prettiness, and I would raise my hand behind them and gently raised them off the flower. I remember recently I saw some a huge group of butterflies in a little grass field and they were dancing together…(if you know what I mean) I noticed that they would land on the concrete ground and on the pile of dirt on the grass and well I tried to catch them. I just couldn’t help it. This was no easy task, as soon as I sneaked up on them they flew back up, but I was persistent, and these butterflies kept coming back. It was once again a game of tag, I would try to sneak up onto them as they were on the concrete or on the pile of dirt and immediately they flew away.

After a while they fluttered in my face I guess they were annoyed but I was having fun, nostalgic fun. Hours past and I stubborn and I believed one of the butterflies just gave up. It had landed on the concrete and I was like “Oh!” And I ran back from the pile of dirt to the concrete and that butterfly just stood there. I got close to it and it just stood there. I knelt down and held out my hand and it still just stood there. I picked it up from the ground in extreme excitement I squealed. I just caught a butterfly that I don’t even know the name of! WOOHOO!!! I yelled at some nearby people and yelled “I caught a butterfly!” I was ignored but I didn’t care. I let the butterfly go and jumped onto my electric scooter that’s been parked at the side and rode off in total glee.