Once upon a time, there were a few bugs.
Not anything extraordinary, just a couple of bugs. Some mosquitoes,
a couple of flies, a small army of ants, a grasshopper, a wasp,
and a spider all hung out in the same tree.
Now this tree was evil-tempered, a real
mean pine tree. He HATED bugs, all bugs. If it had more than 4
legs, it was a bug, and he hated it. So, he asked the sun to help
him get rid of the bugs that crawled on his branches, and ate
his pretty needles.
"Brother Sun," he called, "I
need your help!"
"Brother Pine," said the sun,
"I give you light to grow with, what more do you need from
me?"
"I've got bugs crawling on me, brother,
and I need your help to get rid of them." The pine tree showed
the Sun his trunk. "See these ants? They are right at this
moment chewing up my needles for their nest. I have no way of
stopping them! If they keep going, they will eat all of my needles.
I will be defenseless against the heat and I will die."
The Sun thought about this. "I see
your problem, brother Pine, and I have an idea. You are full of
sap, are you not?"
The pine tree agreed.
"Yes! It flows every spring, and whenever I have a hole in
my bark. It helps me stay at one temperature, and makes sure I
do not die from exposure. Why?"
"Well, brother," said the sun,
"you could use that sap as a weapon. Whenever a bug crawls
over an open area of your bark, you could let your sap roll over
him. The bug would be covered by the sap and be unable to crawl
on you anymore."
"True. That would get rid of them."
The pine tree thought about this. No more bugs crawling on him!
This made the pine tree very happy. He shook his needles in anticipation.
"The heat from you would help too."
"How?" The sun asked. He was not
sure he wanted to destroy bugs. Bugs were very useful to the world.
"Well, the heat from you would harden
the sap once it covered the bugs, and they would not be able to
get loose. They would be trapped forever in my sap, hardened by
your heat. Everyone in the entire world would know that these
bugs had the nerve to crawl on me, and would see what I did about
it." The pine tree chuckled to himself, then went on.
"My brother trees would also know how
to deal with this menace. My brother trees Cedar, Palm, Oak, Cypress,
Sequoia, Olive, Chestnut, and Cinnamon, as well as my sisters
Camellia, and Magnolia would all be able to defend themselves
against bugs! You have made me very happy, Brother Sun, and I
thank you." The pine tree laughed again, and leaked sap all
over himself.
"I guess you
are welcome, Brother Pine, but please do not let me know how it
works. It would make me depressed, and I would not be able to
warm the world." The sun hid himself from the pine tree's
happiness. He didn't actually like bugs anyway, but he didn't
want to destroy them either, and he wasn't really interested in
allowing the trees to use his heat to trap the poor little things.
Bugs deserved to live, too.
The sun purposely did not watch when the
mosquitoes got stuck during their big anniversary bash. When the
flies and the ants passed the time of day together, and the tree
sap rolled over them, the sun was busy fighting off the rain.
When the grasshopper got a leg stuck and the wasp tried to free
him and got stuck too, the sun was not watching. When the spider
cried because she was caught too, the sun covered his ears. When
the last fly got stuck while enjoying a succulent berry, the sun
rolled his eyes and didn't pay attention.
When the pine tree
joyfully told his brothers and sisters how to fight the bug war,
the sun pretended to be really interested in the sights over the
horizon. So the sun got his wish, and through selective ignorance,
he did not know what the trees did to the bugs.
The trees, on the other hand, wanted the
sun to get credit for helping them. As a tribute to the sun's
assistance, every piece of hardened tree sap carries the yellow
color of the sun, whether it has a bug in it or not. The trees
have named the hardened tree sap "amber", which in later
cultures is called "golden drops of the sun".
This is why bugs get caught in amber, and why trees are so happy about it.
Other Stories:
Department of
Creative Spending
The
Bog
Clancey
The Beast
Within
G.O.D.D.
True Darkness
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