Lifelong city girl finds herself making a report to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation about the invasive spotted lanternfly.
Well, here's a predicament I didn't expect: I saw these two, separately, on the terrace today. The first one's pretty, right? It was stuck in the crevice between the pavers on the terrace this morning, and dead, so I decided it should have dignity in its demise and deposited it into one of the planters. Then, this afternoon, I saw the second guy, and took photos. I used Google Lens (the most convenient tool for learning the names of unfamiliar plants and animals) to try to identify it.
Turns out the two are the same thing - the spotted lanternfly - native to, among other regions, Vietnam (coincidence? I certainly hope that's all it is). And it's been causing a bit of havoc in New Jersey - it is the subject of a vehicle inspection and quarantine campaign so that it doesn't spread farther. Under the New York guidelines, I am supposed to destroy it, then report it 😬😮. YIKES!! So I tried to capture it, and true to the description of its characteristics on the interwebs (it is reported not to fly so much as hop, despite possessing wings), it hopped - over the railing of the parapet - and either dropped thirteen stories, or flew off.
Well, I have now reported my sighting to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. You might note that New York/Manhattan was not one of the counties under an alert on the New York site - till now? 😳😬 (So now I am harboring the body of a dead fugitive, possibly the first one in Manhattan.)
[Oh, by the way: You know how you have friends who, if you committed murder, would help you hide the body? I AM NOT ONE OF THEM - PLEASE DO NOT CONFESS TO ME. I will defend your reputation, I will help post bail, I will do everything in my power to get you the best defense attorney available, I will listen to why you did it and hold you and likely cry and torture myself that I could not help you before the deed was done. But please do not ask me to help you hide the body, and feel horrible for the victim and horrible for you and horrible about me and my limited capabilities for being a friend; I won't be able to and will feel like I need to report the death to the authorities - as I reported the spotted lanternfly. Just please keep me in the dark till it all comes out.]
Alien "invaders," like this spotted lanternfly, are entirely distinguishable from refugees ... like the Afghan translators and civilian workers and other helpful, on the ground allies and friends of the United States during the last two decades of war, to whom we owe a moral obligation to provide a home here, in our country. But whom we are, shamefully, about to leave in limbo as their country collapses around them to a brutal regime, because we somehow did not get it together to airlift them out over the last seven months. How, how, could we not have learned from Vietnam? How? Beyond, beyond upsetting. The reports have set off some anxiety in me; even without firsthand memories, and only a life of stories of fleeing as a long ago capital fell, heard as I eavesdropped on adult conversations at an age when I was far too young to contextualize, but old enough to understand fear and sadness and uncertainty and trepidation, a refugee child never outgrows the unease and sense of moving amid danger. So I have written to all of my elected representatives imploring them to accelerate the evacuation process.
I checked in with my friend who lived and worked in Afghanistan most of the last decade; he has been furiously writing letters of recommendation in support of special immigrant visas. He is a good one, a truly good one. Heartbreaking, for all of his, and others', work to go down the drain in a disorderly departure, for individuals who helped him, and their families, to be left in danger.
Postscript: In the time it took to edit and add links, Kabul fell. Just this morning I was still urging people to write their elected officials to accelerate the evacuation. I thought there might be days. There were barely even hours. The Good One (formerly "NF") thinks it might not be so bad. A mutual friend, a woman with whom I once worked as a legal assistant, who married a man who runs an NGO for which the Good One worked for a while, also thinks it might not be so bad. I very much hope that is the case. (The Good One volunteered to go back in. At least with such a rapid fall, I hope there will be no need for him to do so. It's already bad enough that he is in a COVID hot zone helping the Rohingya. But he will do what he does - "GO" is an apt acronym for him; that is what he does - he cannot stay put. The realization I could never have convinced him makes friendship easier; it wasn't me, it was him all along. Admirable, truly. But untenable for a relationship.)
[Edited August 15, 2021.]
As of 10/5, 7 spotted lanternflies eliminated. I have become methodical in my technique. It still feels horrible to kill them.
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