Several years ago, it came to the attention of my immediate family that, if bitten enough times, my brother will have an even more severe allergic reaction to a mosquito bite than normal. After being in Florence for a few weeks, I began to form the hypothesis that perhaps I simply require even more mosquito bites to experience the same overreaction. An intriguing theory — but how could it be proven?
Happily, the Florentine mosquitoes are friendly creatures who kindly agreed to take time from their busy, bloodsucking lives to assist with my experiment. They successfully covered any area of exposed skin — arms, hands, fingers, feet — with bites while I slept over the period of two weeks. One was even thoughtful enough to bite my eyelid and facilitate the entire process.
Complete success was achieved on Wednesday morning when I awoke barely able to open bloodshot, puffy eyes and could concentrate on little other than wanting to return to sleep. Though the reaction was far short of my brother’s — and it lasted only a day — I believe that I can safely count myself among the sensitive.
Next I began to experiment with the effectiveness of various repellents. Spray may work — but it could have been that my roommate shut our window that night, tragically condemning my little co-experimenters to the cold dark night. The zappers that our host mother installed also seem to be having an effect, and I will probably have to remove them if and when I feel the need for further experimentation.
But, with the majority of classes beginning to roll slowly into session, the sad hour may have come for me to bid farewell to my dear little bloodsucking friends in the interest of serious study.
I hope they will understand.
