Grasshopper Mindfulness

Walking along the Sycamore Greenway, or other trails through natural areas, has always been calming. "It's cheaper than therapy!" I've chirped on more than one occasion when discussing my outings. On days that are particularly calm and sweltering, when the birds are loafing hidden in the shade and there isn't much going on in the flowers, I snap on the macro lens and shift gears into a walking "grasshopper meditation."

In the summer, almost every step in the grass sends tiny critters hopping or flying for cover. I walk slowly, watching my feet, and following one of the tiny hoppers with my eyes. Then slowly, carefully, I drop into a deep squat and inch closer...closer...closer until the lens is right up on the hopper and snap photos.

I notice the tiny nubs of wings indicating it's not yet an adult. I notice the speckled compound eyes and the segmented antennae. I see the fine downy hairs on its face and body, and the delicate pads on its feet flanked by itty-bitty pointed hooks that help the nymph cling to foliage. I see their powerful hind legs poised to launch the hopper 20 times the length of its little body, and I see the slender tibiae of those legs armed with an array of pointed spines that can be used for defense if a predator gets too close.

While I'm down there, I listen to the rhythmic buzz of a nearby katydid, hear the wind rustle through dogwood leaves, feel the sun on my skin as it peeks out from a passing cloud. I look around and see other grasshoppers clinging to the tips of blades of grass, or a quick beetle awkwardly scuttling through a mass of plantain leaves toward cover, or a diligent weevil digging at a leaf with its marvelous snoot. 

I see the speck on a rough, broad Prairie Dock leaf that turns out to be a slender moth, with metallic patterned scales glinting on its neatly arranged wings. I inspect a leaf with holes chewed around the veins, searching in vain for the insect that caused the damage. Sweat trickles down my back as I drop one knee to the ground to lean closer, looming in with the invasive lens until my target leaps away, or I start to feel silly snapping dozens of photos of the same motionless hopper and force myself to stand.

Then on to the next grasshopper, this one green with a dark stripe flanking its back on either side. As it attempts to hide behind a blade of grass, peeking out first one side, then the other, I smile at how clever and effective this simple evasion tactic is. When it tires of peekaboo, it springs away to safety. 

I can't identify the different grasshopper species I see. There are little brown ones, and little green ones. There are the "gravel" hoppers with their mottled brown and gray coloring to blend in perfectly with rocky gray alleys. There are grasshoppers with round, bulbous heads and grasshoppers with angular, slanted heads. I can see the same type of grasshopper over and over again, and each encounter is new. 

While I'm stalking grasshoppers, I'm not thinking about all the ills of the world, or the work task looming in a few days, or the chores left undone at home. I'm not thinking about anything at all, really, except this moment in time, with this one grasshopper that I'll never see again. Am I the only human it will encounter this closely? Will this little nymph survive to reproduce, or will it be snatched up and eaten by a bird later that day? 

It's a type of walking meditation, a lesson in mindfulness combined with communing with the minuscule individuals that are, any other day, overlooked as nothing more than a hopping speck swept aside by an unaware, unhesitating step.