It started raining caterpillars

I should've trusted my instincts.

We pulled into the market and I noticed it right away — caterpillars falling from the trees.

Not one or two. A lot.

Kids were Easter egg hunting. Parents were just letting them run around in it.

Everyone else kept setting up, so I told myself — why am I going to be a baby about this?

We set up under our oak tree.

For five hours, it didn't stop.

They were climbing onto everything — the tent, the table legs, the tablecloths. I didn't realize what that was going to lead to.

We thought we could just knock them off and keep going. We were wrong.

It wasn't one or two. It was thousands. Tens of thousands.

About halfway through, they made it inside — crawled up onto the canopy and started falling on us from above.

And then it hit.

It felt like a scene from a horror movie unfolding around us — slowly at first, and then all at once.

Everything felt heavy. Time felt slow. And then everything started to itch.

One fell into our sampling, so we shut that down immediately.

A vendor behind us had already broken out in a bad reaction — someone had to give him Benadryl.

And then they crossed a line.

A couple of them had crawled into my mom's shirt and were on her back.

I shook them out — and that was it.

We started packing up.

We were shaking the tables, the tent, stripping the tablecloths — trying to get them off, trying not to take them with us, just trying to get out of there.

Later, I found out they were tussock moth caterpillars. I hadn't even looked them up until I got home. We were just in operator mode.

But by then, it didn't matter.

They left their hair behind. On everything. On us.

That's what really got us.

What I didn't fully realize at the time — this wasn't happening to everyone the same way.

Most people had a few.

We were right under the tree they were feeding on.

Both my mom and I are still dealing with a rash five days later and have officially decided:

👉 they can have that tree.

– Punita