Do Flies Know When They’re About to Die?

Today I watched what seemed to be an old, tired fly climbing on a fence and I wondered—do flies know when they are about to die?

There is nothing wrong with wondering about things. When an apple dropped on Sir Isaac’s head he wondered—and discovered the law of gravity.

When Thomas Edison saw lightning strike the ground he wondered—and discovered electricity.

When Sir Alexander Fleming noticed colonies of staphylococcus bacteria in his Petri dishes avoiding mold in 1928, he wondered—and discovered penicillin.

When a Swiss engineer returned from a hike in the Alps in 1941, and wondered about the burdock burrs sticking to his clothes—he invented Velcro.

When Percy Spencer was working on a radar-related project in 1946, and noticed a chocolate bar in his pocked melted more quickly than expected—he wondered and invented the microwave.

Wondering can be beneficial…but wondering if flies know when they are about to die? Who wonders about something as inane as that? My son Luke would understand if he was still here with me. He taught me to see the wind.

Christina Rossetti, who was born in 1830, wrote the poem, Who has seen the wind?

Who has seen the wind?

Neither I nor you:

But when the leaves hang trembling,

The wind is passing through.

I read this poem to Luke when he was a child. I read scientific facts and explanations to him as to why it was impossible to see the wind. But Luke continued to insist that he could see the wind. And one day when we were out in the desert Luke taught me to see the wind. He was right. So the son of my heart would understand his mother wondering if flies know when they are about to die.

Not even Luke, however, would be able to tell me how my wondering about flies would benefit life on this earth.

So, while I don’t know if flies know when they are about to die, I do know that our Lord God is a Mighty God who does wonders. “You shall praise the name of the LORD your God who has dealt wondrously with you…I am the LORD your God and there is no other.” Joel 2:27.

And that is a wonder for all of eternity.

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Mistakes!

Mistakes. We all make them. At least, I do.

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Not all mistakes are bad. Naval engineer Richard Jones dropped a tension spring, watched it bounce – and invented the Slinky toy.

Sir Alexander Fleming was searching for a “wonder drug” when he found penicillin – by accident. He had discarded a contaminated Petri dish. He noticed the contamination was dissolving the bacteria around it.

One of my favorite mistakes was made by Ruth Wakefield, owner of Toll House Inn. She was attempting to make regular chocolate cookies – but had run out of baker’s chocolate. So she broke sweetened chocolate into the dough…and invented Toll House chocolate chip cookies.

George Crum lost his temper over a hard to please customer and invented potato chips from a plate of fried potatoes. Silly putty, the microwave oven, pace maker, and saccharin were all birthed by failure – mistakes.

I love the legend about a cook in China who was experimenting in the kitchen – and invented fireworks! It seems that charcoal, sulfur, and saltpeter were common in kitchens 2,000 years ago. The cook accidentally mixed these substances together and compressed the mixture into a bamboo tube. BOOM! It exploded. I’m not sure what happened to the unnamed cook.

I recently read a book where a male calico cat is one of the heroes. Due to genetics, almost all calico cats are female. The book portrayed opossums as cat-eaters. Opossums are non-aggressive and will play dead rather than attack. Cats are far more likely to kills possums than possums are to kill cats. In the Texas Hill Country, possums came up regularly and shared the cat food with the cats. No one ever had a spat or got hurt. Sometimes books and authors get it wrong.

I love the Bible account about men bringing an adulterous woman to Jesus. “The law says she should be stoned. What do you say?” If Jesus said, “Let her go,” they would condemn Jesus for disregarding the law. If Jesus said, “Stone her,” His followers would leave Him because He preached mercy and grace. Jesus said, “Let the one without sin throw the first stone.” The accusers left. Jesus told the woman, “go and sin no more.”

It was easy for me to forgive the author’s mistakes about calico cats and opossums – especially after “Captive of Fear” was released and I read the kindle copy. BOOM! Desert instead of dessert – twice! (Now corrected.) This after professional editing & me reading the edited copy.

Authors should be forgiving and humble. You never know when a cat-eating possum might stumble into your book!

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