Where I live, the fireflies only seem to appear for an hour every night during the first three weeks of July. After that, I don’t know where they go.

Fireflies are the most saintly bugs. I am filled with awe and feel lucky each time I see them. How can such amazing creatures exist?

The other night, the Chattering boys happened to be together, staring into the screen of a computer at the moment I noticed the fireflies. “Get off the computer! Get out with the fireflies!” When they didn’t seem to hear me the first time, I became a little hysterical.

“Okay, Mom!” They sort of stomped out. Then they themselves fell into the coming darkness of the street outside. And they ran with the fireflies. I could hear their laughter, their call for jars to hold the fire in for a time. We punched holes in the tops. We looked. Then we let them all go.

The Chatterings are nine and twelve years old. Cute little boys. How many more summers will we have moments like this?

There are more links online for a band called Firefly than there are educational links on how fireflies work. Here’s information on bioluminescence generally. The children’s book “Sam and the Firefly” doesn’t quite capture the whole feeling of a firefly’s life, and it becomes a morality play at the end, but I remember being quite fascinated with the story when I was a kid.