Worms

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Published by: John Taylor on 21st Nov 2011 | View all blogs by John Taylor

We have a tree-planting project in our town. All the schools have nursery beds where the children plant little twiglets. If they survive the depredations of other children (no vandalism so far) they will be re-planted to form a wood entirely grown by the children of the town.

Today I was helping dig one of the beds with a group of children and classroom assistants. I guess the teachers weren't allowed out.
Quite a few of the chidren were clearly new to soil. 'It's all muddy!'
Some seemed new to worms. 'What's that?'
One girl said, 'I'm frightened of worms.'
'Are you?' I asked.
'Yes, like my mum.'
'Could you just move that one for me, so we don't hurt him by mistake?'
She gleefully picked up the earthworm and showed him/her/it to her classmates. Then she gently placed him/her/it in a safe place and picked up another one.
Her friend said, 'She's frightened of worms.'
'Are you still frightened?' I asked.
Yes, like my mum,' she said, curiously stretching out the earthworm she had just picked up. 'This one's NORMOUS!'

Comments

16 Comments

by Wrathnar the Unreasonable 6 months ago

Disturbingly Freudian - shame on you!
by Noodledoodle 6 months ago

worms are much nicer than spiders, no legs see? Kids are funny about minibeasts. My boys have an aversion to all things winged and legged and slimy, but my daughter, the youngest of them all has developed this strange fascination with creepy things she finds in the garden and even licked a slug once, well she said she was giving it a kiss, niiiice.
by Skylark 6 months ago

Hee hee, love it!
by John Taylor 6 months ago

Freud consulted indoors, and drew out the dreams of the lazy rich. Anyone digging in the November rain wouldn't fantasize about more than a hot cup of tea, Wrath. You may find spiders in your dreams tonight.
by Wrathnar the Unreasonable 6 months ago

There are always spiders in my dreams. Always.
by AlanP 6 months ago

Worms do a handy job in my lawn although I do get irritated when they take a straight line through my carrots in the vegetable patch. Overall, though, they are of use. Spiders would eat flies and thus be useful were it not for the way we keep on removing their webs, which makes them rather useless as domestic pets.

Worms for me.
by Gerilyn 6 months ago

I always pick the worms up and move them out of the way when I'm digging. It makes me shudder when I skew one in half. I wish they'd scarper when they hear me coming- but they don't.
by John Taylor 6 months ago

Yes, it was worm suicide this afternoon, Geri. They come to the surface when there is a thunder of hooves. Evolution may have given them a way to find tasty manure, but evolution didn't foresee that the thunderous hooves of a class of year fives would be a prelude to an earthworm-stretching contest.
by Gerilyn 6 months ago

"Worm suicide". Awww :(
by zoolane 6 months ago

Now my daughter Charlotte who seven, she would loves very minute of the worms ,soil and plant the twigs.
by Caducean Whisks 6 months ago

Ah John, I was enjoying that until you mentioned worm suicide. It's hard for them to run fast, you know - what with burrowing through clay and no legs an' all. Worms say 'healthy soil' to me. Not literally, you understand; they don't have the right mouth parts for English any more than they have legs. But a good, writing compost heap does it for me.
by Charlie 6 months ago

Lovely story, John. We had gardening as a primary school subject when I grew up and it still is taught in many schools where I come from - it was always such a wonderful feeling to eat what we'd been tending for so long.

As for the worms - some birds draw out worms by drumming on the ground with their feet, and then they just wait until they pop up.

Btw I don't dream about spiders, but see them very frequently in that moment just before I get to sleep. Sometimes I do think there's a spider abseiling from the ceiling and see the cobwebs and all - and then I switch on the light and nothing.
by Caducean Whisks 6 months ago

Gah! A good *writhing* compost, not a good *writing* compost. Although the latter has possibilities for my lesser known works.
by TheApprentice 6 months ago

I had a friend who used to eat them! He would squash them and then pop them in!
by Barry Walsh 6 months ago

Fine story John and splendid diversionary thinking by you. Going fishing as a kid meant not only being familiar with holding worms but being rather hard on them. I still handle them these days, by fistfuls, when taking them from the compost bin to spread around the lawn. Fishing also meant getting used to dodgy practices that I couldn't contemplate today: like holding the multicoloured (dyed) maggots in your lips as, one by one you put them on the hook.
by John Taylor 6 months ago

Interesting, Barry! Can you tell a fisherman by his lipstick? Our first disection in school biology was an earthworm, and I seem to remember that it was a couple of the boys who nearly fainted, not the girls. Writing compost, Whisks? Surely it's made of Cloudy stuff...