It was another morning of wading thorough the bad news as the economy continues to tank and the gnawing fear that nobody knows what to do about it permeated the Sunday paper.
But the story that got to me was back in one of the middle sections of the Trib. It talked about the global decline of the firefly, from southeast Asia to the southern forests of the United States.
It was last October when we were staying at one of those bed and breakfast homes in western North Carolina. It was their last weekend as they were about to close up until the following spring.
I sat out on the a rocker on the old deck that looked out over a rolling pasture where I watched the cows, as if by some silent signal, began to meander off to some unseen barn.
It was then that the first fire flies began to flash. At first there were only one or two but within minutes the entire lawn in front of me was alive as thousands of lights spread out down the hill.
In my mind I could remember summer nights as a boy in Tampa, chasing “lighting bugs’’ across the backyards of our neighborhood.
But that was a long time ago and for the generation growing up today in Tampa, one of those simple pleasures they will not know.