At the start of my birthday week, on my drive out to the golf course for a women’s clinic, I got stung by a bee. Yes, in my car. Yes, while I was driving 50 mph. Yes, on the back of my neck. Yes, it hurt. There’s still a giant lump underneath my hairline.

Happy Birthday to me.

I don’t know what it is about bees and about them stinging me. I don’t consider myself a threat. But I seem to be predisposed to this happening, while completely NOT bothering them. Unless you consider me bothering them in so much as I interrupted their flight path by being on a road with my motor vehicle. That fucker… it seriously dropped from the small popped crack in my sunroof.

I have been stung several times over my trips around the sun.

The first time
The first time that I was stung by a bee it was in my grandparent’s front yard, in the fall, after jumping into a pile of leaves that my precious Pappy had just collected for my sister and I. It was behind the knee. I was around the age of 10.

The second time
The second time that I was stung by a bee it was at Conneaut Lake Park (RIP). This occurred maybe a year or two after my first time. I was at a food kiosk in the middle of the infamous midway, loading up my fresh cut fries with a few bottles of malt vinegar. I put my arm down on the counter. This one must have been more painful than the prior bee sting because I unlocked a memory about our family attempting to find the first aid center to get me some care.

The third time
It took a few more years, but I was stung again. The third time took place while laying at the beach, Headlands Beach State Park (GOSH how lucky was I to grow up near this amazing place?! Man, do I miss living near water.). He, the bee, got my 19-20-year-old finger. I didn’t leave the beach. That would be stupid. (It takes me much less to want to leave a beach these days.)

The fourth time
The third time took place in an era where I was diagnosed with panic disorder and was taking xanax on the regular – not because of bees but because of a reduction in my brain’s serotonin or something. Mid-2000s. Anyways, the bee got me. Finger again. Stuck in my hair on the deck of my house and I pulled it out. Man, do I have such a vivid memory of the bathroom I was in, tending to the sting. Tending to my inevitable panic attack. This memory of the bathroom also unlocked a memory of the bathroom at my grandparent’s house where I tended to my first bee sting. (Maybe I need to write about memorable bathrooms in my life.)

These were the most formative memories. Of course, there were others. If you want to know why I ABSOLUTELY FREAK THE FUCK OUT when bees are around, now you know the “why.” Is this a lot of times to be stung by a bee in one’s lifetime.

*my favorite play in Cards Against Humanity. I can still hear an old friend from my old neighborhood saying it in his distinct voice, despite not seeing (or hearing) him in over 7 years. BEES?