A single desultory fly zooms to and fro within the confines of my lampshade, pattering and pinging against it without cease. This is what you are doomed to do if your life span is three days long and all other forms of life regard you as a despicable annoyance.
Now the fly has escaped into the greater realm of the livingroom, and rain has started falling outside, hurtling downward from turbulent masses of warm and cold atmosphere somewhere high above while the fly hurtles itself in a zig-zag pattern, the very illustration of insanity.
It seems the fly has brought the rain. His random trajectories and self-destructive bashing against the lampshade earlier had the same pinging busyness as the rain does now on the hard surfaces of the house. He flung himself toward my open window earlier, rushing headlong into the interior of my room, probably to his great surprise (having hit the pane a few hundred times before that), a weird little pratfall move that flies are prone to, I would think, erratic as all their flight is, without purpose and without aim.
And here I sit quietly, not randomly moving like fly nor pelting raindrops, but in juxtaposed stillness. I wonder if flies come from another world where everything but they move wildly in all directions at once so that the fly feels like I do now, perfectly still. In his mind, the fly could be holding still, while his senses tell him everything else really is moving all willy nilly. This assumes flies have minds, albeit briefly lit ones, of course.
One way or another, a moving fly is immediately aggravating, but the rain is not, even though both make the exact same pattering sound as they hit things. But since the sound is the same, they are alike, and who would make that comparison except a sitting-still human with sleep in her eyes on a Saturday night?
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The Nature Conservancy, California State Parks, The United Way











Interesting observation
Although, I think I prefer wet rain to a dry fly. In Uganda, the rain brings millions of flying ants. After the rain, they are in piles in the driveway, and on the car. WE don't have to clean them up, however. Our guards and gardener usually scoop them up and eat them.
Cheers,
Sharon
Hi Christine, I've never
Hi Christine,
I've never figured it out - which comes first, the rain or the flies. Rain I love. Thank goodness flies don't have a long life span, and, as Sharon said, they seem to be tasty to some. It's all relative. Enjoyed your post.
Best,
~Lynn