The cicadas or katydids (I'm not sure which is which or if they're the same thing) are singing up a storm.......maybe even literally. It's beautiful to hear them from inside my house and not just when walking the dog at night. Yes, that means my windows are open after weeks of having on the central air. Yippee!! This time of the year is so full of life. Driving home from Menard's today w/ Doug, I looked, I mean really looked at all the shades of green in the fields. Everything is full and lush. This is how Iowa is meant to be, alive and growing. In just a couple of months the fields will be stripped bare. I hate that. I know harvest is necessary to continue life, but the earth is left naked afterward. Then when the snow comes, there is stillness.....no katydids.
I did a little Internet research on the differences among katydids, cicadas, and locusts. I don't understand it all, but I did discover that there IS a difference b/w katydids and cicadas although they both sing at night. So I'm still not sure what I'm listening to right now, but I love the rhythmic pulse. The main reason I went searching on the Net was to find out about the connection b/w the katydids and the first frost. One site I found on weather superstitions said that the first song of the katydid means the first frost will be in six weeks. I'm going to interpret that to mean the first time I was able to listen to them w/ my windows open. I also found the superstition that Dad and Aunt Irene always say, "Rain before seven, clear by eleven." I'm not sure if it can really be considered a superstition or even a myth b/c it generally seems to ring true.
I found another website w/ FAQ's about locusts, grasshoppers, cicadas, and katydids. One question was, "Are cicadas June bugs?" I could've told them the answer to that one. No, June bugs are those giant, black bugs that come out in June, and Cicadas are like grasshoppers that come out in late summer. Duh!! My first experience w/ a June bug was as a little girl, who, after having my bedroom light on for a long time, turned it off only to hear something hitting the screen of my window. I ran downstairs to tell Mom that something was outside my window, trying to get in. She came up to my room, sat on my bed, listened for a short while, then upon hearing the bumping against my screen, knew immediately that it was June bug. She told me he had been attracted to my light. I liked that, but I still think they're big, ugly bugs. But the katydid, ah the katydid, what exactly is it that Katy did? She reminded me of a summer night a really long time ago when I had a mom to protect and instruct me.
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