michael-dean-k/

I am subscribed to a r/MantisEncounters, and just came across “do you think the Mantid Beings have connection to the Praying Mantises on earth.” Many believe that a mantis encounter is not random, but a visitation from a higher-dimensional being (ie: they can see through the eyes of their earthly counterparts). Of course, very woo.

But it gets me thinking on how my last two apartments were baptized through insect visitation.

The last one was welcomed with a massive cockroach at the last step entering the unit, which to me symbolized the poverty of the artist (as rendered by Burroughs, Ed Sanders, and others of that generation). In this apartment, the day Fios was being installed, there was a praying mantis on the front door. The symbols that come to are MC Escher and the DMT realm, high insectoid weirdness of which I've never experienced firsthand.

Both bugs are (relatively) rare—sighted either a once a year or once a decade sighting—but what's more interesting to me is the act of narrativizing and mythologizing a place that has no associations yet. An empty apartment has no experience, no memories, and so the first few remarkable moments feel more significant since your meaning-making apparatuses are active.

After 3 slow innings at the Yankees game, I told my wife, “watch, this guy is going to hit a home run,” and then boom, next pitch, lefty Cody Bellinger pulls a line drive HR just left of the foul pul. The odds are 1:300. What’s weirder is the pitch before I said “foul ball” (the home run was almost foul). Could not reproduce.