100 Odd Words # 5 - The Mayfly

“Oh, very much like a mayfly,” she says as she shifts the child in her arms.  “If you make the comparison with the understanding of the full lifespan of the mayfly.  Mayflies live much longer than one day.  That tiny lifespan we think about, when it mates and dies, is only the adult phase.  Before that, the mayfly swims about in larval form for months, sometimes up to a year.  The process of metamorphosis gives the mayfly the ability to procreate but leaves the digestive system vestigial and nonfunctional and thus it dies because it can no longer nourish itself.”