Why Does God Make Flies?(Charles A. Mazzarella) Why Does God Make Flies?


Remember that old adage, “Don’t believe everything you read.” However, not all that is written down is a carefully controlled mixture of Truth on steroids and the facts. A man that I work with, and have known for years, told me some true facts from his biased perspective. I can attest to what he has told me, as I was a witness to his actions. I have been helping him try to figure out the answer to his question, as his actions vacillate between clemency and the execution of those that disturb him.

God or, that hippy Mother Nature, in His or Her wisdom, had some reason for making a vast assortment of creatures on this planet. This is applicable to any living plant, amoeba, person, or insect. It is the latter that my friend Stan is in active pursuit of, for a reason-filled answer to his perplexing query. You have seen the variety of Life and this is wonderful and wonder-filled. The Earth would be a boring place to live on if there were fewer genetic transmutations. The result would lead to many people that looked very, very similar to you or me, and only eight species of rose instead of the hundreds that exist today.

But, in this diversity of Life we live in and around, did you ever wonder why there are so many different species of the same life form? Better yet, getting closer to trying to help Stan answer his question, why do some creatures, mainly in the insect world, exist at all? Besides being in the food chain, what other purpose do they serve?

Now, I am no entomologist, a bug doctor, but I take my best, educated guess to help Stan answer his question, as we toss back a beverage made from fermented hops. When he was a boy, he was a cereal killer. As he matured, that role changed a bit, as he applied his more refined palate. Now, he like many others, could be considered a mass murderer; especially in the numerous eyes of his victims, if they could speak our language. His body count far surpasses that of your typical serial killer.

Stan loathes flies; flies of any type, from house to horse. He takes particular interest in killing the ones that latch onto him, making a meal from his precious red blood cells. In an ill humor, he has commented many times, “Just what type of creatures do they think they are?” He has also said, “Those parasites have some nerve!” When besieged by several, persistent flies, Stan’s rage surfaces and gone is his usually calm demeanor. The buzzing and hovering, and quick take off vex him to the point of having to find any nearby weapon to eradicate them. As he relaxes in nice outdoor furniture, while trying to read the paper, flies do their thing and Stan reaches for a nearby magazine or rolls up that newspaper. On occasion, I have also seen his hands become a swift catapult of Death.

I grew up hearing my portly grandmother curse nearby flies as they nipped at her stocking-bearing ankles. She was old fashioned and relied on the traditional germ ridden swatter of flies that she got decades ago at the Worlds’ Fair in New York; that was in 1939 for those of you keeping score. How many generations of flies had that thing killed? I do not think it ever saw water or soap; Lava, Borax or her preferred Cameo.

No one in my immediate family shares my grandmother’s contempt for those buzzing maggots, like I do. That half a gene must have skipped a generation. My sister however, when we were children, used to be a tormentor of carpenter ants. Her favorite weapon of choice was smoldering bug repellents, similar to sticks of incense, we used to call punks. I do not know if she still goes out of her way to squash a few on her jaunt to the urban conveyance that takes her to work. I believe she is retired from being the menace of the ant world. I actually like ants. There is one species that I ask this of too: why do they exist, the Fire ants of the South?

As of late, in my current position and location, Stan and I have become masters of death, when it comes to flies. The incessant heat of this part of the world perpetuates the propagation of flies. He and I kill as many as we can. My daily count is up to twenty, I believe. There is only, what seems to be, a 3-week cold snap here and even during that time, the flies here put on their winter ware to make a quick appearance on that first warm day. There they linger, on dumpsters and the multitude of palms in that desert, to pester us for the next ten months of uncompromising heat. We are not even working in a jungle climate. That must be the birthplace of an incalculable number of flies and biting annoyances that fly and creep in their exoskeletons.

So, why in heck are there so many damned flies in the world? What purpose, other than being food for frogs and fish, do they serve? Whatever their role on Earth, they do it well and know how to survive. They are masters at further infecting the ill of the world and bothering our livestock and revered horses. It seems to Stan and me that they are only a hindrance: to ruin picnic dinners, annoy our pets, and sicken us by the spread of the diseases they supposedly carry. Why did God make flies? That is one of a few questions I will ask if I get to that tranquil place in the clouds or where ever those eternal partiers and onlookers hang out. My advice though: be prepared to perhaps never receive an answer to the fly question, until you get there.

Stan and I are of the same mind on this subject. What purpose were mature maggots, now with the ability to cut through the air, given? The only thing we thought of, as we refreshed our emptied glasses of ale, is that they have always been. Flies are among the few survivors of some petrified growth spurt this planet had back before we arrived. They may have been larger back then and probably got the dinosaurs angry as well. Through the eons, they survived to distract and anger us today; the flies, not the dinosaurs.

Only recently, have Stan and I took the time to observe the pesky, multi-eyed, restless critters. We are all under the impression that they help spread disease in some way and are filthy insects. This is obvious when we see or learn where they choose to spend their time: piles of feces, flapping their wings near putrid garbage bags, and at other locales of ill repute. In this way, their jurisdiction seems endless. But, trying to give them the benefit of the doubt, one day, Stan and I made a brief study of the hated flies.

Take the time to observe one once, when you and it are still enough for it to bathe. Similar to how our friends, the felines clean their soft faces with their harsh tongues, flies use their front legs to groom their eyes of multiple lenses. Like other creatures, flies use their hind legs to obsessively clean their transparent wings; the things that make them champions of transport. So, study them a bit before you reach for that nasty plastic swatter. Maybe, buy a new one every Spring. If we give them a reprieve, maybe there is something we can learn.

Still, flies have to learn to not be so indifferent concerning their pursuit of vile places to visit. They need to restrain their adventurous nature. But, they do have a relatively short Life span. (Swat!) There goes another; up to 21, almost a record.

Long ago, they must have learned about the philosophies of Carpe Diem and Hedonism, as they rested on some wall millennia ago, just watching and “listening”. That chemical message must have been passed down to the numerous generations that followed and still is passed on today. Can you imagine their genealogy? The family tree of a fly must be as straight as those that like to practice incest, and one single fly’s great-great-great grandmother is still alive, or was just killed a few minutes ago, as I used an envelop filled with hundred dollar bills to smack another into the next metaphysical plane. Ya gotta use whatever’s handy to smash those varmints.

Try as we might to come up with a solution, Stan and I are ready to give up in desperation. We turn to others, like yourself, to help us solve this mini mystery. We ask you to consider that they must have some purpose. As those bug doctors and learned scholars of motion study flies and mosquitoes, another family of seemingly worthless creatures, maybe something will be learned. By their mere existence and daily life, perhaps cockroaches, mosquitoes, and flies will be the catalysts for knowledge of a mode of transportation or the development of amazing flying machines; Da Vinci would be proud.

Though you may be reluctant to do so, give flies a break. But, Stan and I are all for grabbing that old, rolled-up magazine, when no one is looking, to see how high your fly body count can get during a nice Summer day. Just remember, when you’re done with the killin’, go wash your hands.

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