Hello Everyone,

Thinking about the hot desert temperatures that have already creeped up on us this summer, I would like to bring to everyone’s attention the sounds of the desert that coincide with that heat.

As I was walking through the desert the other day I was overwhelmed by the sound of the cicadas this year. Some years it seems that they are more noticeable as the dominant sound of the desert than others. I even caught one for a moment before releasing it to watch it buzz away in frustration because it flew into me and then the house, and then a car, and then the house’s window again. Each time making its little buzz of frustration louder and louder. Silly little agitated bugs. Ha!

Although this will not fit into my Eerie for Thoughts segment I feel a bit of a creepy feeling sometimes when I hear those clicking noises or the humming type of a whine. You know the “eeeeeeee” type of noise that the cicadas seem to send traveling through the air. The feeling I get is kind of the feeling of being alone in the desert and overwhelmed by that sound. Maybe because the sound is such a familiar accomplice to the heat and stillness is probably the reason behind this. But once you get too close to the bush or tree limb that they are nagging on they suddenly stop letting you know that they are indeed watching you and not just making tunes.

You always have eyes on you in the desert even with the extreme heat.

The bugs are a native species here in this area and come every summer letting us know that the monsoons are not too far off. Hopefully. This is the blessing behind these bugs when I hear their music playing in my ears because it reminds me that soon we will have some comfort from this extreme heat. Then we get the lovely mosquitoes in, what a lovely summer full of bugs here in the desert, isn’t it?

Thanks for reading,

Joshua Crane Dowidat