The Cockroaches Are Not The Problem

 

Today I was so angry. So, so angry. Like a toxic cloud, the anger descended upon me. It was triggered by a stupid thing, an announcement tapped on the building’s door about a disinfection that will take place someday next week. For the cockroaches.

It happened so many times in the past. They came and did whatever they do and for a while the air would choke me and then I would find dead cockroaches all over our building, on their back, feet in the air. The survivors would try and sneak in our apartment, to the delight of our cats, who would chase them, play with them and then, of course, kill them.

I hate cockroaches, just like everyone else. But, look around, so much trash everywhere.

The first thing you fell when you enter our building is the smell of mold, of things rotting away in corners. Nobody knows what really lurks in our basement. People drag their trash bags from the elevator through the lobby, leaving a wet streak of slops. Sometimes, they throw the trash bags from a distance, missing the trash can altogether, the litter spilling everywhere. Nobody ever cleans it. In the summer the stench is unbearable.

Sometimes the sewerage is clogged because people throw all kind of stuff into their toilets, from diapers to clothes.

On the third floor it is impossible to pass through. There is a bike there, chairs and lots of carboard boxes. In case of a fire, a death trap. On the fourth floor, a broken, I assume, washing machine, a couple of small tables with pots filled with dead plants. And a heartfelt thank you to our neighbor who stopped smoking. Congrats! Before that, he used to throw on the window the still burning cigarette butts. Many of them landed on the roof of our car that was parked under his window.

There is so much filth and neglect around us.

Nothing works. The elevator is broken almost all the time, the water doesn’t have enough pressure to reach the upper floors. But we decided to wage a war against cockroaches. Not for a minute to ponder and ask ourselves why do they love our building so much. According to some tradition or other, it is forbidden to throw bread in the bin, so people put plastic bags filled with bread on the lid of the trash can or on the ground. It stays there until it rots. But they determined the cockroaches are to blame. Who knew?

We decided to kill the cockroaches. Their bodies will litter the staircase and the lobby for many days afterwards because nobody will bother to sweep them. We’ll feel a sense of righteousness every time we will look at them. We exterminated the roaches, they’ll say. While, in one corner, they are already scuttling. They would survive an atomic bomb, did you know?