Grasshoppers

The Grasshoppers are the creatures Wen catches and studies in the yard, where her first collection becomes a carefully recorded project rather than a casual game. She worries about their safety inside the jar, tracks individual differences in her notebook, and seeks to understand what their stillness means. The scene makes their small, visible lives a measure of Wen’s attention: she wants to observe them, but also to keep them healthy and eventually let them go.

The collection and its conditions

Wen begins by looking across the lawn for grasshoppers whose movements she can follow. The glass jar she carries smells faintly of grape jelly and is sticky inside; its lid has holes punched into it for air. She has promised Andrew that she will release the insects before they get cooked in the homemade terrarium, and she plans to keep the container out of direct sunlight. Even before catching one, she considers how captivity might harm them: a grasshopper could jump into the sharp edges of the holes in the lid. To reduce that risk, she intends to catch smaller ones, which jump less powerfully and leave more room in the jar. She also plans to speak softly so they will be less likely to panic and strike the metal edges.

The arrangement of the jar reflects this effort to make a temporary habitat. Wen pulls grass up with its roots and places it inside, then sets the container in shade. Her attention is practical and specific: ventilation, temperature, space, and vegetation all matter to the insects’ welfare. The jar is homemade, but she does not treat its improvised construction as automatically safe. Its holes can admit air and still present a danger; keeping it shaded can prevent overheating, but does not answer every question about how the captured animals are faring.

Catching and identifying individual insects

A large brown grasshopper, wide enough to span her hand, springs from beneath Wen’s foot, hits her chest, and makes her stumble backward. She laughs and dismisses it as too big. The encounter contrasts with the smaller specimen she is seeking: she loses sight of the little green insect during its high leap, follows where it lands, and tries repeatedly to catch it as it darts away. Wen tells it that she means no harm, that she will release it eventually, and that she wants to learn about it so she can help the other grasshoppers stay healthy and happy.

At the edge of the lawn and gravel driveway, she finally cups the small insect in both hands. It is the first grasshopper she has ever caught. Although she feels it trying to jump through her closed fingers, she resists the urge to open her hands for a look, then runs to the jar and quickly screws on the lid. Inside, it bounces against the glass and tin before stopping on the greenery to rest. That sequence gives her first catch two distinct stages: the difficulty and excitement of capture, followed by the abrupt limits of the enclosure and the insect’s eventual stillness.

Wen assigns this grasshopper number one and records it in a palm-sized notebook whose pages are already ruled into rows and columns. Her entry includes an estimated size, color, sex, name, and energy level. The size estimate is inaccurate: she writes two inches. She identifies it as green, records it as a girl named Caroline, and marks its energy as high. These notes show both the reach and the limits of her method. She wants to distinguish and compare individual insects, but her measurements and classifications remain a child’s first approximations rather than reliable scientific data.

She then catches four more of similar size: two brown, one green, and one in an intermediate color. She names them Liv, Orvin, Sara, and Gita, drawing their names from schoolmates. The notebook and names turn a handful of similar-looking insects into particular subjects of observation. Rather than treating the jar’s occupants as an anonymous mass, Wen gives the first one a number and an identity, then expands the collection through further captures.

Wen and Leonard observe the jar

Leonard joins Wen outside and responds to her project as something he remembers enjoying as a child. Wen distinguishes his recollection from her own purpose: for her, the activity is more serious. Later, when he asks what she will do, she invites him to help watch the insects. They sit cross-legged facing one another with the jar between them while Wen lays out her notebook and pencil. The arrangement makes Leonard a companion to the observation, but Wen remains the project’s organizer, with the records ready at hand.

Their conversation also connects the jar to the cabin. Leonard asks whether Wen punched the holes in the lid herself; she explains that Eric did it with an old hammer and screwdriver found in the basement. She remembers that space as cold, gritty, and full of shadows, spiderwebs, ropes, rusted tools, and old life jackets. Eric has since declared it off-limits because it contains sharp, rusty objects that do not belong to the family. The lid that makes the grasshopper jar usable thus comes from a household object-making episode, but Wen’s recollection also marks the limits adults place around her access to tools and materials.

When Leonard comments that the insects are not doing much, Wen first thinks he means her fathers and is ready to defend their importance. He clarifies that he means the grasshoppers, which are sitting quietly. Wen immediately worries that they may be sick. Leonard offers an explanation grounded in their behavior: grasshoppers hop when they need to, jumping takes energy, and these insects may be tired after being chased; constant bouncing against the jar’s walls would concern him more. Wen does not simply accept reassurance. She adds tired, sick, unhappy, hungry, and scared to her notebook as possibilities, keeping uncertainty visible rather than deciding that stillness has one obvious meaning.

Observation, care, and captivity

The scene repeatedly puts Wen’s wish to study the insects beside the conditions she imposes on them. Catching them is necessary to her project, but she promises to release them, plans around the dangers of the lid, and worries about their comfort after they stop moving. Even her initial intention to choose smaller specimens follows from the space and jumping power available inside the jar. Her concern is not abstract: it is tied to metal edges, direct sunlight, crowded movement, and the possibility that the grasshoppers are frightened or unwell.

At the same time, the notebook records how limited observation can be. Wen can note color, estimate size, assign names, and watch the insects rest, but the quiet jar does not tell her exactly what each one experiences. Her list of possible explanations preserves that gap. Leonard’s practical account gives her another interpretation, yet she continues to document her concern. The Grasshoppers therefore anchor a small but telling scene of childhood inquiry: care motivates observation, while the act of collecting makes the observer responsible for conditions the insects cannot choose.