“Kissing the Beehive” by Wolf Parade which clocks in at 10:53.

The Schmidt Sting Pain Index is a pain scale rating the relative pain caused by different Hymenopteran stings (wasps, bees, ants, etc.). The index starts from 0 for stings that are completely ineffective against humans and finishes at 4 for the most painful stings. In the original study, some descriptions of the most painful examples were given, e.g.: “Paraponera clavata stings induced immediate, excruciating pain and numbness to pencil-point pressure, as well as trembling in the form of a totally uncontrollable urge to shake the affected part.”

Subsequently, the scale has been refined. In 1990 a new study was published that classifies the stings of 78 species and 41 genera of Hymenoptera. Notably, Schmidt described some of the experiences in vivid and colorful detail:

1.2 Fire ant: Sharp, sudden, mildly alarming. Like walking across a shag carpet & reaching for the light switch.
2.0 Bald-faced hornet: Rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door.
2.x Honey bee and European hornet: Like a matchhead that flips off and burns on your skin.
2.0 Yellowjacket: Hot and smoky, almost irreverent. Imagine W. C. Fields extinguishing a cigar on your tongue.

The silly comparisons go on, but we’ll stop there. For it is that final stinging Hymenoptera with which we’re most concerned today: the Yellowjacket. More specifically, those Vespula maculifrons (the Eastern Yellowjacket) which build concealed nests, usually underground.
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Summer. August even, likely 1987. Yes, definitely. August 1987, hot as SHIT. It seemed hotter then than it does now. Not over extended periods of time, but just in spikes. Like, most days were probably in the low 90s, but this one day the temperature was around 140. That’s what it felt like at least. I remember, my friend Jay and I (name not changed, he deserves to be outed for what he did) were doing some work for his uncle to earn money. The job: move massive amounts of firewood from waaay over on one side of the house to waaay over on the complete, opposite, side. Seemed like busy work, prison work, even then. But hey, the pay was phenomenal. Fifty bucks! Fifty dollars each! An entire treasure chest full of loot to the two of us. Money that we were planning to use to go to Carowinds (and by “go” I mean have one of our moms drive us there) and/or buy some more Oakley sunglasses. Or, money that we’d find a way to spend on some manner of self-indulgently carefree material reward. Really, though we were working, we had no need for extra cash.

We also had no need to go fishing after our work was done. It wasn’t as if we needed to catch food for our families, or wasn’t as though we’d know what to do with the fish if/when we caught one. We’d struggle to grab a hold of it, take some rusty pair of pliers, and wrangle the hook out of its cheek before sending it off to be caught again by us the following week. The circle of life in a small suburban lake.

Okay. So, we also had no business jumping into that hidden little lake we were about to fish -it was a small adventure reaching it, down a path not traveled in years and through some thick brush- no business at all swimming there. It was still very pure and natural, not the kind of place one wants to swim. And Jay’s house, about a quarter of a mile down the road, had a swimming pool. An obvious target for two overworked sweaty youths. But no. We were hot and exhausted and ready for an adventure -always ready for an adventure- and jumping into that lake for the first time ever was the best thing we could come up with. In the past we’d stood on the edge and looked into the murky shallows but we never jumped in. All of that was going to change on this day.

So there we were, adventuring into the known wilderness. Towards Mount Lakemanjaro…fishing poles, swim trunks, tackle boxes and bait in hand. Come to think of it, I’m not certain we thought much of the impact that our swimming might have on the environment. Specifically, that it might’ve severely hindered our chances to catch any fish if we, say, jumped into the lake and splashed around a bit before trying to fish there. But, that’s what we did. We had to, because it was there; and, had never been done before. At least not by any kids we knew who’d lived to tell of it. The jumping into the lake was the daring part of our adventure, the bit that caused that day to go down in history as legendary was accidental. But, no less, legendary.

After an extremely quick dip into the water we setup a spot on the other side for the fishing part of our adventure (it’s worth noting that this might’ve actually been a pond…it was pretty small and unkempt…but there were fish there, and, to us, it was a lake). Not many fish had been caught in this spot, but word was that there were a few bigguns in there to be had, so we decided to use Jay’s lucky frog lure. The thing was magic, worked every time. And believe it or not, it worked almost as soon as it landed in the water this time.

“I got one! Shit! It’s huuuge!” Jay exclaimed. He reeled it in with difficulty but then realized it wasn’t coming out of the water without a net. “Here, you take the pole and hold it there. I’ll run home and grab a net.”

No problem. I stood with the beast as Jay’s fishing pole bent severely under its weight. It was BIG. But it wasn’t going anywhere, and by the time Jay returned it had little to no fight left in it.

“What the…?!” I questioned when he showed up with the net.

“It’s all I could find, watch out,” he said, moving me out of the way and taking the fishing pole. The net he’d returned with wasn’t just any net, it was a net with a ten foot long pole attached to it. The net that his dad used to clean the swimming pool. We both laughed at the incongruous nature of the situation as he struggled to get the fish into the net.

“You want some help?”

“No, I think I got…” he didn’t even finish what he was saying. Mid-sentence the awkward swimming pool net dropped like a seesaw with only one kid on it, the end of the pole landing right at my feet. In under a second I was covered, swarmed, attacked by a nest full of yellowjackets. Remember: Eastern Yellowjackets build concealed nests, usually underground; or, right next to where I was standing.

“Bees!!! Aaaaargh!!!” I screamed. Loudly, as loud as I ever have. I probably said a swear word or three before I took off running towards Jay’s house. The stings were happening in rapid-fire fashion. I could tell that some of the bees were stinging me over and over again. It felt like I was getting shot by a miniature .50 caliber machine gun as they attacked my chest, my face, my ears…everywhere. There were some caught in my bathing suit stinging away and some flying next to me as I ran, darting in for stings like kamikazes dive-bombing a battleship. Though I was in some form of mild shock, and probably not fully feeling what was happening to me, the pain was still outrageous. I couldn’t outrun them but I kept running, swatting in the air as I ran. Jay was right behind me screaming. We both were. That quarter mile to Jay’s house suddenly felt like five hundred miles.

What a sight it must’ve been for his mom when we finally reached home. She was already outside as we ran up screaming and crying and trying to tell her what had happened. Quickly she ushered us over to the garden hose and had us strip down. Bees fell off of us as we removed our clothes. Some hung there on our bodies, dead. Stinger in place: nest successfully defended. An honorable death.

The water from the hose felt like fire. Or our wounds did, something. All I remember thinking was “it’s not stopping, it HURTS!”

Once we got hosed down and put some dry clothes on we did the only thing we could. Sitting there, shocked, moaning and groaning, we tallied up our individual scores. Who was stung more?? An important question that needed answering. I secretly wished for my own mother to take a little extra time in arriving to pick me up so that we might finish counting. I had a feeling I was going to come out on top. The “winner”?

Jay: “21, 22… 25, I think. I have 25.”

Me: “42? No. 45, 46, 47? Is that…no, that’s just one big sting. So that’s 46? I have 46!”

Forty-six. That day, back in the summer of 1987, I was stung forty-six times by yellowjackets and lived to tell the tale. Ever since then I’ve felt a connection with bees and wasps. Closer to them. They no longer frighten me at all, and back when it happened I secretly hoped the experience would turn me into some kind of superhero. Shoot, Spider-Man was only bitten once. Me? There were stings everywhere. I figured I deserved some powers or something as a result, but ultimately, I was probably very lucky to come out of it as relatively unscathed as I did. I mean, I stood there right over a massive yellowjacket nest when it had a huge metal pole come smashing down upon it and the entire hive attacked ME, the intruder. Fair enough. Can’t go kissing a beehive and not expect to get stung.
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For the record, in regards to that Schmidt Sting Pain Index, I was in fact stung in my mouth. And I’d rather have W. C. Fields extinguish a cigar on my tongue than to experience the horrendous feeling of getting stung on the roof of my mouth again; all the while fearing I’d inhale or swallow the insect before consciously gathering it in my mouth to spit it out as I ran. Awful. And yes, that yellowjacket stung me on the way out too… twice.

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*above photo from HERE, front thumbnail from HERE.

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