Tears for Cicadas

 I hear my southern friends talking about the cicadas a lot this May.  They tell funny stories of manly-men screaming when finding one hitchhiking on their shoulders, or of the background noise that ranges from a powerline-level humming, to a chorus so loud you have to holler to hear each other. 

It’s been a long time since I’ve lived where the cicada emergence was cause for discussion, but my Alabama memories of dusk on a front porch swing are punctuated with such sounds.  I’m heading there now, but first a stop in Nashville to see my son, Brad.  I’m about to get my first hug from him since Christmas, and I can’t wait to see his face. 

As I pass the Nashville airport, I get a text from Brad that his plane just landed, returning him from vacation.  I laugh and tell him I can pick him up if he wants, but he’s got friends in the parking lot already.  He tells me to meet him in Franklin for dinner before I drive to Nolensville to stay with dear friends.  So, I plug the destination into my GPS and continue southward.

I drive to one of the quaintest downtowns I’ve ever visited and look for familiar buildings and a spot to park.  As soon as I cut the engine, a familiar frequency greets me, and it feels like a homecoming.  But, as I step onto the sidewalk into approaching dusk, the sight of so many airborne cicadas unnerves me.  The trees in front of the Fourth Street church of Christ are full to the brim with the critters, so I hurry by and stretch my legs after my ten-hour drive, then set out to find a bookstore I fondly remember.

To my delight, Landmark Booksellers is still open this late. I stroll slowly from room to room, back to front, lifting classics and new releases until I spot a book that’s been on my reading list for years.  I’ve heard quote after quote from Viktor Frankl, and each time I think, “I ought to read him someday.” I pay for Man’s Search for Meaning and go next door to wait at the restaurant.

“Do you mind a table outside tonight?” The young hostess scans the crowded indoors.  It doesn’t appear I have any other options.

“It’s pleasant out. I don’t mind, but will the cicadas leave us alone?” I don’t particularly want one to land on my plate, despite my father’s reports they taste like shrimp.  How does he know that anyway?

“I don’t think they’ll bother you.  But, oh, I feel so sorry for them.  You know they’re blind!  They don’t mean to grab onto people.  And they don’t bite.  They’re just groping around looking for each other.”  She leads me to a table where I can watch for my son’s approach on the nearby sidewalk.  I thank this cicada sympathizer and watch her loose skirts flowing around her Birkenstocks as she returns indoors. 

Blind?  I picture the cicada casings I found on trees as a child.  Didn’t they have big eyes?  I smile, thinking of this big-hearted young woman who has room to care about bugs.  Lately I’ve been pondering the capacity of the human heart for love.  I even wrote a picture book manuscript exploring the idea.  I ended my latest draft with this author’s note:

“Humans often try to quantify how much we love someone.  I was thinking in adult terms of how limited my ability is to love, but as the idea of me threading a camel through the eye of a needle is impossible, yet with God it is entirely possible.  I realized volume doesn’t apply to God or to His love, and if I let Him fill my whole heart, His limitless capacity for love could fill me as well.  The thought reminded me of Ecclesiastes 3:11 ‘Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time.  He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.’ ”

I open my new book and read the Foreword.  “We have come to recognize that this is a profoundly religious book.  It insists that life is meaningful and that we must learn to see life as meaningful despite our circumstances.  It emphasizes that there is an ultimate purpose to life.”  I look at pedestrians passing by and digest Viktor’s food for thought. I meditate on this idea and add it to the construct of my capacity of the human heart musings. 

All those thoughts are drained instantly when the one I’ve been waiting for comes into view.  I stand and wave, then I’m getting the hug I came here for, as my heart swells with affection.  I doubt I’ll shed any tears for cicadas when I leave Nashville, but they will certainly flow from missing this young man.