Speaking to a friend recently about how much we were looking forward to summer, she mentioned that she always associated the sound of cicadas chirruping with the warmer months.
I had an instant vision of myself, aged about 8 or 9, out in our backyard, in the dark, armed with my Dad's garden shovel, trying to find those damn cicadas and bash them over the head.
I can still hear my exasperated mother calling me to come inside.
I was not a good sleeper as a child, and the incredible noise that issues forth from those little critters used to drive me nuts.
I don't think I ever actually made contact with any of them - they have a remarkable ability to be invisible and to shut up when humans approach, but it didn't stop my frenzied, murderous attempts to silence them.
I used to wrap up my watch in a jumper and put it in a drawer as well, claiming that the ticking kept me awake. These excuses were just furphies, employed to delay my bedtime as long as possible.
The real reason I couldn't sleep is that I was a worrier with an over-active imagination.
I saw bogey-men that weren't there, I used to line up my heaviest books near the bed so that I could throw them at intruders [that'd work!], and keep my eyes closed in the dark so that ghosts wouldn't see them shining and come for me.
Thank God those days are gone.
Funny how having children cures insomnia. Motherhood gave me the ability to sleep like never before, anywhere, anytime.
I still worry about things, but one of the huge joys of being older is that I no longer sweat the small stuff.
When I listen to my sons and their friends agonizing endlessly over what I call "Home and Away"-type trivia, I feel a great sense of relief that my priorities are different now.
Whereas once I would focus on the petty dramas of my everyday life, now it's joy that I look for and appreciate. Being able to see the big picture and knowing that whatever the problem is, it will pass, is a great gift, and one of the many rewards of aging.
Although we'd love to stick an old head on the young shoulders of our kids so that they could avoid being derailed by unimportant minutiae, we can't. We just have to let them learn the hard way, like we did. They wouldn't listen to us "oldies" anyway, just like we didn't.
I moved to Melbourne from Queensland last January, and getting up in the dark at 4am to get ready for a day's filming when it's below 10 degrees Celsius has been a challenge.
So this summer I'll be reveling in the long, delightfully light evenings right up till daylight saving finishes. Walking my dog on the beach, wide open windows, twilight swims, barbecues, mangoes - heaven.
And those noisy cicadas won't bother me in the least, now that I know how lucky I am.