Pretty Eyes!

  A dragonfly kept flitting about the wisteria arbor (or lack thereof since I cut it all down!) as I was picking up the remaining vines.  It was a rather nice large dragonfly of sort of a purplish color.  I do not recall seeing one exactly like this one before.  After noticing that the insect did not seem to be particularly frightened of me, I decided to see if it would actually let me hold it.  While it was on the edge of the wheelbarrow, I slowly rested my hand near the face of the critter.  Sure enough, after a moment, the dragonfly crawled onto my hand.  Well, now!  I had a new friend!  With the bug in hand, I was able to study it a bit closer.  What amazed me was the brilliance of its eyes!  They were the most gorgeous teal color and absolutely gleaming!  All of a sudden, the dragonfly tilted its head to one side and then took off in flight.  My new friend did not go far.  It lighted on a board just a few feet away and enjoyed the shade for a bit.  I was able to photograph the insect at my leisure as it had not a care in the world least of all my presence.  I felt a bit honored that it trusted me!

  Speaking of those amazing eyes, did you know that whereas humans only have one lens in their eyes, dragonflies have some thirty thousand? This allows the critter to see in all directions at one time making it much easier to catch prey and avoid becoming prey itself.  While this gives the dragonfly a much broader view, the poor critter does not see detail too well.  I suppose in the critter world there is no need for detail.  As long as the food supply is handy, nothing else is too important.

 A tiny bit of "Back in the Day" trivia...I remember hearing a tale of how some folks would reprimand their children.  If a child lied, the parents would point to a dragonfly and exclaim that the critter would come in the night and darn the child's lips together so they could not tell any more lies.  Geez!  Way to scare a poor kid for life!  Yep, lying is terrible but what type example was the parent setting by repeating a threat like this? The threat, itself, was a lie so perhaps the parent should have been wary.  A dragonfly might just visit them at night as well!  The poor, innocent insect became known as the "Devil's Darner".