Cockroaches January 29, 2008

**Please proceed–there are no photos in this post**

This is the story of my long-term relationship with cockroaches. It all began back in an apartment in Kichijoji, Japan.  Roaches are common in Tokyo.  Your house could be as clean as your Italian grandmother’s and the roaches come anyway, and they aren’t shy.  They would pop out in the middle of the day and just crawl up the walls.  My family ended up spending a lot of time in Japan, so we got used to these cockroaches, which I believe are this species.  We learned what Japanese roach traps looked like, how they worked, and we hid them everywhere in all of the different the houses we lived in.

A few years later, when I moved into my own apartment in center city Philadelphia, I met a different kind of cockroach.  The first time I met one, I had just moved in and I still didn’t have a bed.  I was lying on my mattress on one side of the room, and heard a strange scratching sound.  On the other side of the room was my nemesis, the gigantic water bug of a roach that was casually skittering across the floor.  It was so huge I couldn’t kill it so I trapped it under a cup.  I found one of his siblings in my bathroom not long after, and his fate was the same.  Luckily, the cups I used were plastic.  They stayed under those cups for at least a week and didn’t die.  They met their demise when my parents came to visit and my dad actually cut a hole in the tops of the cups and sprayed a lethal amount of roach spray down into the cup.

Luckily, in the next apartment I lived in with Matt, the only wildlife we had to deal with was a family of mice.  Then we moved into the suburbs and I thought that I had finally ended my relationship with the cockroach.

A few weeks ago, the cockroach came back into my life.  I was at work and went to the ladies room, and there it was, just hanging out on the toilet seat.  The exterminator was called, and all of us women in the basement were relieved that we didn’t have to walk upstairs to use the ladies room.  Yesterday, I was in the same stall doing my business, I turned my head, and there he was again, on the bathroom stall’s wall, staring at me.  I fled, and the exterminator was called again.  Later that day we were again assured that the cockroach was taken care of, but he showed himself again later in the day, and then he brought two of his friends to hang out.

Oh, Mr. Cockroach.  What will it take for you to realize that I have had enough?  It’s over!  I never want to see you again!  But until you get it, I will continue to walk up to the third floor to use the ladies room.

This is my dedication to you, Mr. Cockroach.  You have kept my life interesting and you have made me a stronger person in the process.  But I still want you to go away.