If a tiny moth moved into our closet, how long would it take him to eat everything in sight and empty all the hangers?
The reason I ask is that one of those freeloaders turned up in our bathroom a week, or two, ago. I was equipped to dispatch it with a Kleenex, a sink or a toilet, but my wife would have none of that. The moth appeared to be delicate, sensitive and, above all, cute.
I tried to adjust to him. I even named him. I called him Pete. … Pete Moth, get it?
I assigned him a gender, but it’s merely guesswork. I tried taking a look, but I couldn’t find any clues.
I Googled moths to find out whether he’d actually eat all our clothes. Come to find out, they have a strong preference for silk. In my place, it’s denim or nothing. He’d have a better chance of finding some silk to dine on in a dairy barn than my house. If he wants any silk, he’ll have to put an ad in the paper.
But, silk or no silk, I put all closets under lockdown and removed all curtains and bedding. When I go in to take a shower, I don’t take my shorts off until I’m behind the shower curtain. and I take an especially quick shower so the moth doesn’t gobble them down before I’m done, just in case. and I dry myself with paper towels.
He showed up a week or two ago on a corner of a bathroom wall and didn’t move for days.
If Lola, my wife’s cat, spotted the moth, I’m sure mortal combat would quickly be under way, and the cat would wind up giving Pete a good licking.
A few days ago, another moth moved in and began rooming with Pete, although they each have plenty of space. They don’t seem to be very communicative with one another, but they probably don’t want to get on each other’s nerves, which I think is wise. I know a lot of people who can’t stand to have moths around, so why should another moth be any different?
There’s always the chance, of course, that Pete has a girlfriend. As I said, I can’t be sure of the gender of most moths, if not all, so my stab at their relationship is strictly guesswork.
But the one member of our household who’s the most interested in these two moths is Lola.
I pointed out to Lola one of the moths resting upside down on the ceiling, and she was immediately captivated. She is the best athlete in the house, and she showed it the second she saw Pete.
If you watched the gymnasts in the recent Olympics, you were undoubtedly impressed. Backward, forward, upside down, right side up, it doesn’t matter to them. But they’re all stiffs compared with Lola.
She leaped onto the sink and sprang up toward the ceiling aiming to gulp down Pete and his companion with one swipe. She missed, but she landed gracefully without taking her eyes off the intruders.
If they wandered down to the wall, I think Lola would bug them to death.
She was making an awful racket bounding from floor to sink, to wall and back to floor. I don’t know whether moths have ears, so I can’t say they were bothered by the invasion. I did go in once and saw them flying for the first time, so I think they could sense a nuisance.
After a while, the noise was impossible to ignore, and I closed Lola out of the bathroom. In fact, we had some errands to run, and Lola seemed to have forgotten the entire episode, so before we left we opened the bathroom door. Not that Lola had any use for any of the equipment in there, but there was no sense in barring our cat out of rooms in which she had been perfectly welcome until the moths moved in.
When we got back, I went into the bathroom to see if Pete and his babe were enjoying their visit.
The bathroom had been abandoned. Or emptied. There was no sign of Pete or his housemate.
I looked at Lola and asked, “Have you seen Pete and his buddy?”
She looked back without replying, but she licked her lips. I thought I detected a smile.
Any moth that moves into Lola’s house should be warned he has less of a chance of being the eater than the eatee.