How to catch a butterfly

"When water and fire fight, water wins." My son was explaining to me, "But when snow and fire fight, fire wins!"

It was homework time and I had the feeling he was fighting the inevitable.

"Time to do homework Sean." I said matter of factly.

Sean was sitting in his chair with his finger deep in his nose watching his iPad.  

"Daddy," he said looking up at me, "Do teachers have any idea how boring homework is?" 

There was a lot to unpack with that question but,

"Yah," I said, "I'm pretty sure they do."

"And they don't care?" he asked with the sadness of ages.

My son's questions take me to places.  Sometimes good places.  Sometimes bad places.

"Daddy, is it hard to catch a butterfly?"  He asked out of the blue.

"Yah..," I said, not knowing where that came from but curious where it was going.  "But not that hard." I reconsidered, remembering spring days.  Back in the 1950s.  Oh so clear.  The butterflies on the hedge.  They came for the honeysuckle.  Black and yellow with large red spots on both wings.  Alive and magical.  We would catch them with our bare hands and play with them until all the pigment had been rubbed off their wings and they were dying.  

And we didn't care except that they were no longer beautiful and no more fun.

"I used to catch butterflies when I was a boy with my friends." I said to him.

"Do you know what the easiest way to catch a butterfly is?" he asked me.

 I thought about that for a moment.  We would sneak up on them with cupped hands and usually miss. 

"How?" I asked.

"You catch the caterpillar."

Now THAT made me smile.

But...

"Time for homework kidboy."

Calbayog City 2023