Have you ever found a solitary bug in or around your bed and thought very seriously of sleeping elsewhere for the night? No? Just me?
These reflections are brought to you by the infestation of late; my new buddies who love to snuggle up at night and share my pillow and my dreams. Ants. But of course not just any ants, the ones that bite.
Our mattresses are made of coconut fiber, and everyone says this is great for your back. But what they don't say is that it's also great for ants, because these little guys really seem to love it! I think the first infestation began only a few months into our stay. Both of us were affected, and after putting the mattresses in the sun and rubbing some tea tree oil on the bed frame it seemed to do the trick. We were sleeping alone again for a while. Im not sure what it is that prompts their return, but every so often I find myself waking up to tiny little red ants biting me in places that I do not wish to be bit.
Recently however, the ant infestation was so great I actually marched upstairs and stole one of the new mattresses from the (empty) dormitory. I woke up one morning to the feeling of the ants crawling on me, and thought, "whatever we can peacefully coexist, I don't even feel the bites anymore." But when I got out of bed and peeled my bedsheet back to assess the damage, I saw that it was the worse than any gathering of my little friends that I had experienced yet. They even began to chew hundreds of holes through my bottom sheet (I keep two sheets on the mattress explicitly for this purpose). So I did as I usually do, took my sheets off, threw them in the wash, and lugged the mattress up to the terrace to lay it in the sun. But this time, as I passed the dormitory (that has yet to be used ) I decided to take one of the still-plastic-covered, brand-new mattresses that was just begging for me to use it. Really I'm doing the mattress a favor. It was unable to fulfill its true mattresshood by simply lying neglected on an unused cot.
I won't even pretend to say we enjoyed a peaceful coexistence, those damn ants and I. But I did learn how much my bug tolerance has changed. Despite my efforts over many months, there was no way to permanently exterminate the ants in my bed. Even now, there is a good chance they will come back, as my new mattress is still one made of coconut fibers. And when they do come back, we will do our dance again and again, each time with more acceptance. I don't want to accept biting ants during my quiet slumbers, but at least they're not the giant spiders! It seems that here, each time a previously held boundary is pushed, I allow it to move. So many boundaries, fears, and peeves have been shrunk. Who knew that I, the compulsive neat freak, could wake up in the middle of the night to the feeling of fresh ant bites and the promise of more to come, and simply shrug, roll over, and fall back to sleep? I did not see that's for myself. And yes it's a very small problem comparatively speaking, but it's a personality win in my book!
