Fireflies [Otherwise known as Lightning Bugs]

If you know me at all, you know that I am a tradition-sort-of-person. I'm all about the "classic" thing to do - in essence, I'm a tourist all the time. Even in my own home, my own city, my own life. Some might say by worrying so much about the "experience," I miss the actual, well, experience. I like to think we each make our own experiences, and that's just the one I choose, but that's for another day. Ultimately, there are some things, some traditions, some experiences, that really do just make life better.

Fireflies in the summer is one of them.

My entire life I have absolutely loved that time of day when the lightning bugs are out. Those few moments between day and night, the magical time of day that is twilight. It's the transition between a sun-filled-awesome-but-jam-packed-and-tiring day and a [sometimes] "night out on the town." Twilight [side note - I CAN'T WAIT for the day when I can speak/write/hear the words "twilight", "eclipse" etc. without thinking about *shiver* Robert Pattinson and *sigh* Taylor Lauter.End note.] is a magical  

pause

in the day. It's a

breath

right before the night hits, whatever a summer night may bring. I always wait until the lastpossiblemoment to turn on the lights, once the darkness has truly settled. Because once I get up and those lights go on - the spell has been broken. It is now nighttime. The day, whatever fun and play that might have brought, is over, and no matter how much fun the nighttime might be, another day has ended and the summer is one day closer to being autumn.

Lightning bugs symbolize this for me. They only come out in certain parts of the country at certain times of the year [one other thing you might know about me is that i LOVE to be a part of behind-the-scenes, special, VIP, in-the-know things]. Not to mention, they are mesmerizing, awesome, and weird little insects.

To me, lightning bugs [or fireflies, as you might know them] signify that summer has, indeed, arrived. They are my childhood to me, they are relaxation to me, they are a breath to me.

Here's one of my favorite scenes from any [childhood] movie, my favorite because it pretty successfully captures that elusive magical feeling that is twilight. Do you know why that is?

The lightning bugs.



Not to mention, it's a great song.