Well we did get out of the mud. Eventually. After more rain. A tractor tried for hours and eventually pulled us out, in the pouring rain. When the rain stopped thousands and thousands of white butterflies fluttered by. What a wonderful site. They all seemed to be going somewhere. I wish I knew where. Definitely somewhere more important than the mall. We have been waiting 4 hours for the road to dry out (ha that sounds familiar) before turning back to the tarmac and the butterflies are still going by. I wonder how this whole migration thing works. There’s no memo that goes out to everyone saying pack up we’re moving south on the 13th at 09h00. I can understand Wildebeest all migrating across the Serengeti but that’s more of a food thing. I guess the main canoni Wildebeest nudges his buddy, hey dude the grass is greener on the other side. His whole family move along, others join up and before you know it, 1 million Wildebeest trek off in search of better pastures. The young are probably shown the odd landmark on the trek. “Look Johnny, see that funny shaped mountain, it’s the halfway mark. Flo, will you stop your whining, no we are NOT there yet and if you and your brother don’t stop fighting I’ll send you both to great aunt Mabel for the day and you can hear all about the good old days when the grass was sweeter before the Tsetse flies came along.” Junior: “Please no mother, she’s always on about us not swishing our tails enough”. Translated into human simile that means “Aren’t you cold? You must be cold, go put on a jersey before you get sick”. Father Wildebeest puts an end to the whining. “That’s enough children, you can be dam lucky you aren’t pulling an ox wagon over these plains. Now follow my dung trail, eat grass and shut up”.
So the butterflies are more of a solo thing since they don’t do the whole family thing in their cocoons. Thousands of them all going in the same direction are more intriguing to me. Damm, its times like this that I miss having Wikipedia. Theo says he thinks they only live for a day cos what happens when the rain comes and their wings get wet. So what, like they pop out of their cocoons and all just happen to fly in the same direction? Keep the sun on the left, keep the sun on the left is all they think about for a day. Why don’t you get individuals who think to themselves, gee I think I’ll go left here at this bush. Where do they all go to is what I wanna know? Are they off to their own butterfly Nevada? It’s not like you come over a hill and there’s 4 million dead butterflies all lying in a heap. What drives them? Is it just to get laid? I’ve forgotten the process again, do the worms bonk or is it the butterflies? I know butterflies pollinate the flowers so do they pop out of their cocoons after a good stretch, think to themselves, wow that was an awesome dream, my goodness I feel different, less hairy today and hey look I can fly. I think I’ll fly to that flower and suck out some juice. Ooh look, there’s another one oh look there’s another. My, I wonder if all those other butterflies know of a place where there are more flowers? I think I’ll follow them. Meanwhile the first butterfly is humming to himself, I believe I can fly, spread my wings and fly away……..as any right minded butterfly would, and next thing, jeez where did all these other dudes come from? Follow me, I’m lost. There are hundreds of thin blue hairy caterpillars walking a thin blue line all over the show here as well. I’m sure they must be connected to these butterflies. I can just imagine them thinking, gee that butterfly reminded me of my old neighbour. Same facial hair.
All I do know for sure is, the guy who organised the tractor to tow us out the mud, said if you stand on one of the caterpillars, your foot will burn for 2 days. What I’ll leave you with is, what came first the butterfly or the worm?
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