Cicada Parade-a

Summertime, and the cicadas are emerging.  We had quite a cold spring this year but the ninety-degree heat is more than making up for lost time.  My garden plants are finally taking off and on Friday I heard the first drones of a few lonely cicadas as their brethren make their way out of the ground.

With greater numbers of the human population getting vaccinated and the CDC telling us that things really are improving, the emergence of local cicadas after isolation seems to be the perfect metaphor for human life.  Hans and I have gotten together with friends in person a couple of times in the last month and today we wandered a popular street in Baltimore (still occasionally while wearing masks) and even visited a brewery.  Hello, everyone!  It's been a minute!

Speaking of Baltimore, the city is hosting a public art event in honor of Maryland's 17-year Brood X cicadas.  All around the parks and streets you can find sponsored sculptures that have been mass-produced from a casted design and then decorated by local artists.  Hans and I went on a photo safari at Patterson Park and Hampden (one of our favorite neighborhoods).  While we walked through the park you could see cicada nymphs and adults clumsily crawling around.  Many became lunch for the local birds.  I guess that explains why my backyard bird feeder is suddenly not being visited as much!

All of the below photos can be found on the Instagram page.  For more information about Cicada Parade-a, check out their website here. There's a map where you can click each little bug to see an image of the sculpture that it represents and a description from the artist.  My favorite from today is the "salt box" named Pete!