We came to believe that a Power greater
than ourselves could restore us to sanity – The Big Book
I was walking up a set of stairs the other day. I wasn’t
alone; I had a companion who was also upwardly mobile. Simultaneously, we
noticed a common house-fly creeping around on one of the treads. It was still
winter, and so it seemed somewhat out of the ordinary to find the critter
lurching about on the step like a drunken sailor.
My companion remarked quite matter-of-factly, “Oh look,
there’s a fly crawling about.”
I stepped on it and said in reply, “Not now.”
It is always my intention to be kind to all of God’s creatures,
but must confess I find flies both disgusting and disturbing. I know the sorts
of things they like to play around with and eat, and I want no part of it, so I
am quite fly-i-cidal when I see them out and about. They make me crazy.
I can stand in a room full of flies, swatting them left and
right all day long, and be insanely happy as the dickens. You could call me a
flyromaniac.
One day I was out shopping and found what I thought was a
good deal on a set of fly swatters. It was a three-pack, so I bought two (to
match my six-pack abs, of course). That way I could have a fly-smoosher handy
in every room, for little annoys me more than when I have to waste time seeking
something to obliterate the uninvited wing-nuts. By the time I’ve located the
whacky-doo, the pesty-poo has moved along, so now I have something for every room
– and they were cheap, to boot.
Unfortunately, you get what you pay for. These swatters are
so flimsy they do no harm; they are anything but lethal. In fact, I do believe
the flies have put out fliers inviting swarms to come get massages for free. It
got so bad a deputy sheriff threatened to throw me in jail for operating a
massage parlor without a license! I let fly with my tale of woe, so he let me
go, as long as I promised not to flea the county.
So I gave up the fly swatters for Lent and decided to take
another tack. I went to the local hardware store and purchased packs of tacky
fly-snatching strips. I stretched them out and hung them up by the windows, and
they did an OK job of catching the little black buggers. On the other hand,
they looked pretty unsightly hanging there, and that bugged me. What would our
guests think?
I didn’t mind the strips, so much, but I don’t like seeing creatures
– even nasty flies – struggling in despair. I could almost hear them crying in
their little fly-voices: Help me! Save me! Woe is me!
It makes me feel a bit like a Padre de Sade. Even if flies
are carriers of disease and pestilence, they undoubtedly have their place in
the circle of life (just not around me).
Consequently, I decided to try a different approach. I went
to another local establishment and found cans of pesticide for sale. They were
reasonably priced, and I thought the skull and cross-bones were tastefully and
artfully displayed. I carefully read the instructions and discerned I was
qualified to follow them, so I bought a can and, with more than a bit of
maniacal cackling, took it out for a spin.
I soon discovered a flock of flies congregating on a window,
presumably discussing where to go for dinner. I stood back a few paces, gently
shook the can in my hand, aimed, and pfeut – let fly with a cloud of aerial
ack-ack.
At first, the mist appeared to have had no effect, and I was
quite disappointed, but then … then they began to quiver and shake and soon,
they began to drop like … yes … they began to drop like flies.
Take that, Beelzebub! V-F day was at hand; I’d found my
solution. Those falling aviators looked at me with their googly eyes and the
last thing they heard from me was this: “You’ve been canned.”
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