So, outside my townhome are two massive bushes. I'm not sure of the species, but it's one nature obviously intended to be pollinated by flies. Hundreds, if not thousands of common house flies swarm these bushes... and recently, the swarm has began migrating into our home. Last night, the swarm approached 2 dozen. This presented quite the problem... because for all the precepts I uphold, the first (abstaining from killing) is likely the easiest. So I devised a plan to evict our unwanted guests... which consisted of a red solo cup, and a very thin/cheap plastic cutting board. I shooed the flies out of the bedrooms/bathroom (read: corralled them into the main living/dining area)... turned off the lights, opened the blinds (so as to attract them to the windows). With the setting sun glaring in, they did just as I hoped and began bouncing off the windows. I proceeded to trap them (one by one) between my cup and the window... sliding that cutting board under to keep them trapped as I relocated them outside. I did inadvertently lose (read: squash) two or three early in process (regrettably), but once I mastered the technique, I did save a good 20, which were successfully evicted without harm... leaving our home, once again, free from unwanted guests. I read online that flies are repelled by basil, so I affixed a few sprigs from my refrigerator to the door knocker (in hopes the indoor swarm will be less, hopefully nonexistent, tonight). The entire process was less than 30 min effort on my part... it gave me an opportunity to exercise some compassion... and send the little critters off with metta wishes. Now, I never intended to write about this (until this morning). You see, what prompted me to think of it... was getting my toddler in the car (which has been quite the stress factor of late). Nearly three, and a tad behind developmentally (mainly speech), my toddler has been the poster-child for the "terrible two's" and more specifically tantrums. One of the primary triggers for these tantrums, is getting in her car seat. Virtually every morning I prepare for the emotional storm of getting her into that seat. There is crying, kicking, screaming... she becomes completely unreasonable, and loses all self control. While I can understand the aversion (a toddler wants to romp around/explore, and being strapped in for a 30 min car ride doesn't facilitate that), to call her reaction excessive would be an understatement... I mean based on her reaction, one would honestly believe, that that car seat meant certain death to her. To make matters worse, she's recently learned how to unbuckle her safety belt. You can imagine the safety (and even legal) concerns this would present... and being met with the pressures of getting to work in a timely fashion, I'm sad to say patience isn't always a viable option. Long story short... to keep her in the car seat (and even get her in it to begin with), I've resulted to corporal intervention (read: paddling her pampers). As a rule, violence is NOT an activity I would choose to engage in (doubly so with regards to my child)... but redirection, reason, distraction, even bribery... have all failed, and (at least at this point) I've yet to find an alternative that works. The result, I end up forcing her into the seat, and swatting at her if/when she goes to unbuckle her seatbelt. Now, I remain calm through this process (read: no danger of actually hurting her), but the act is inherently violent, I'm essentially controlling my child through fear and intimidation... which is undeniably wrong (read: bad kamma), but risking her safety (if she unbuckles her seatbelt), my parenting rights (for not legally transporting her), and my livelihood (not making it to work on time)... seem the greater harm in this case. So, what does this have to do with flies you ask? Well, it dawned on me, during this morning's toddler drama... that if I can quickly and easily come up with a non-violent solution for relocating a swarm of flies, why can't I come up with one for getting my child into her car seat? So I'm reaching out to my readership... in hopes that one of you can offer some suggestions. I'll definitely be thinking about it myself, and I wish there was a passage in the tipitaka about this... but sadly, dealing with unreasonable, unruly toddlers isn't something the Buddha offered much advice on. I'm certain there are parallels to be made... but I've yet to find such a resolution. Maybe one of you can point me in the right direction? Maha Metta UA
