It was 8 p.m. on a weekday night, and we had just returned home with our children from a long day out at work and school.
I turned on the lights in my bedroom and saw something move on the floor next to my wardrobe.
It was small and shaped like a dusty sunflower seed. I went closer and found a single bag worm wiggling its way around.
I decided not to do anything about it. I was tired and it was just one, a solo fella. I figured it’d make its way out of my room eventually, plus it looked harmless enough. The kids and I proceeded with our usual night time routine, and I left the room to wind down in front of my laptop and watch a show with the husband.
By around 11 pm I headed back to my bedroom to get ready to sleep, I was tired. But lo and behold, now instead of one bag worm wiggling about, there were eight of them spread out around on the room floor near our bed.
That was it, I had enough.
I took out our vacuum and I started vacuuming the perimeter of our bed where most of them were, and I did a sweep around my closet too.
There. That should do it.
Since I was a kid I had never liked anything that crawled or wiggled on the ground, worms, caterpillars, maggots, and such. Worst were leeches and centipedes. They creeped me out and I stay away from such creatures.
Then I figured that these bag worms had probably been nesting under our bed for a while since more kept appearing over time.
I turned off the lights and snuggled into bed. But before I slept, I thought maybe I should research a little on these bag worms, and that turned out to be a bad idea.
These worms in their bags were moth larvae, that I knew.
I googled how many eggs were produced from these moths, and turned out they lay hundreds of eggs at a time. About 500 to 1000 eggs, that was the number.
It was now late at night. I shuddered as in my mind I imagined hundreds of those bag worms crawling around under my bed, and what if they latched and wiggled their way up the sides?
I decided to take the path of ignorance, at least for that night. I closed my eyes and tried to sleep. I should think no more of it, I said to myself.
Tomorrow’s battle will be its own.
As I drift off to sleep, though my husband had yet to enter our room, I knew I wasn’t alone.
There were crawlies around.