Boys Will Be Boys

Today is the first day in a long time that we've been home without a man in the house. Dan's covering a shift for a co-worker who had to go to a funeral. That being the case, it would have to be the day that I found a black widow spider outside our back door. I was casually sweeping off the steps outside our kitchen and I thought I saw a beetle. It got caught in my broom and was rolled over on its back. Tristan immediately identified it as a black widow. I didn't believe him at first because it looked too big and meaty to be a spider. He showed me the hourglass on the stomach and insisted that it was a black widow. I still wouldn't have believed him but my mom and dad happened to stop by and my dad confirmed that it was a black widow. He and Tristan coaxed it into a jar so that Tristan could show it off to the boys in the neighborhood. There's nothing more prestigious to a seven year old boy than the capture of a potentially deadly insect, you know.

If that were the end of the story about the spider it wouldn't have made it to my blog. It would simply have been an ordinary day at our house.

Tristan got half way up the stairs with the spider before I told him that he couldn't keep the black widow in his bedroom. With my permission, he took his bug jar to Collins's house because he knew this particular friend would be equally fascinated with the spider. He was gone about 45 minutes and came home with an empty bug jar and mud all over his hands and clothes. Again, just another ordinary day.

During the past hour I've come to find out that while at Collins's house, the boys captured two bees and a box elder bug (they had to injure the bees in order to capture them) and they placed them in the jar with the spider. They watched the insects fight it out (Tristan reported that one of the bees bit off a spider leg and the black widow injected venom into the bee). Then they shook the jar violently and buried all of the bugs. To top it all off, they found a piece of paper and made a headstone for the grave.

This probably isn't surprising to anyone who's raised boys or to anyone who's been a boy himself. Dan wasn't nearly as shocked as I thought he'd be when I called to tell him the events of the afternoon. He just said that the boys went to more effort than he would have. I guess this is all standard boy behavior. In other words, BOYS WILL BE BOYS.

If I were my sister Robin (Queen of the Blog), I'd have photos of the black widow, the boys, and the headstone. Unfortunately, I didn't find any of this blog-worthy until Tristan let me in on the events at Collins's house. By that time the spider was no longer with us and I'm afraid it's too dark and I'm too exhausted to trapse down to Collins's house to take post-mortem photographs. So you'll have to settle for these photos of Tristan with his bug jar (I told him to give me a mischievous look) and a close-up of what's left of the black widow, the amputated leg. Yikes, now I know Tristan wasn't exaggerating.