On a beautiful summer day more than a decade ago, Len, me, Sarra, and Vensee all piled in my Subaru and journeyed to Chestnut Ridge to visit with Barb, Marshall, and MacGregor.

The four-leggeds had fun romping around together, while us two-leggeds enjoyed chatting as we were setting up the table for our picnic lunch.

We gave the dogs each a treat, then Barb, Len and I sat down ready to enjoy our feast. Lo and behold, just like the story below, there glided a little fly, not to the food, but onto my hand.

That little guy never alighted on the food, but remained on or near me the entire time. When it was ready to leave, I told the fly that his home was here, whereas mine was many miles away. I gave a little wave of my hand where the fly was sitting and he took flight.

Although that happened many years ago, the memory is as vivid today as it was when I experienced that special time between our two species.

KINSHIP WITH ALL LIFE by J. Allen Boone
Musca Domestica

FREDDIE was a fly. To ordinary observation he was just a common get-the-flitgun-and-let-him-have-it housefly. The kind of creature you kill the instant you see it, not only for your own good but for the protection of your fellow man. Outside of the high rating he got from me, Freddie was utterly without social standing. Indeed, the only thing that gave him the least bit of distinction was the name that a Swedish naturalist conferred on his kind back in the eighteenth century. “Musca domestica,” he called them.

My first meeting with Freddie took place early one morning in my bathroom while I was shaving. Suddenly a fly landed right in the middle of the magnifying mirror into which I was looking, creating the illusion that he was actually on the end of my nose.

Watching him somewhat cross-eyed as I shaved I began wondering why, with all the other places in the bathroom for fly landings, he had to select the middle of my mirror. I also wondered what he was thinking about. My conclusion was that, since he was in Hollywood with its high-powered pretending and show-off influences, he was posing there like an attention-seeking actor, getting a narcissistic reaction from the magnifying properties of the mirror and using me as an audience.

I got to speculating as to how it happened that such a common little nuisance as a housefly was privileged to move its body through space with such freedom, ease and delight, while I, who was supposed to be so incomparably superior, could scarcely get off the ground at all under my own horsepower except in the most ridiculous little hops. Why were flies given the ability to walk around on walls and ceilings, and to play, meditate and even sleep on them, while I was denied the privilege?

Later while having breakfast in my little kitchen, I looked up from my newspaper and there on the edge of my plate was another Musca domestica. I wondered how the flies were getting into the house. After breakfast I
went into the living room to begin the day’s writing chores, and there I discovered another fly standing on top of a pile of yellow typewriting paper.

“If there are three flies in this house, that’s one thing,” I told myself. “But if the three flies that I have seen this morning are only one fly, that is something else.”

I hurried into the bathroom, but there was no fly on the mirror. I went to the kitchen, but no fly was there. Back again to the desk, but no fly on the yellow paper. So I sat down and waited. Perhaps two minutes ticked by; then a fly appeared. He was coming from the direction of the kitchen and he was riding a shaft of sunlight like a tiny plane returning from a mission. It looked as if the three flies in the house were only one fly, and he seemed to be following me around like a lonesome little dog that was looking for understanding human company.

The little fellow circled round and round just above my head; then he dived, banked and landed again on the pile of yellow paper. For some time we looked at each other without the least outward motion but with plenty of action in our thinking areas. Then I cautiously placed a forefinger on the edge of the pile of yellow paper and, with all the friendliness I could put into it, asked him if he would not like to come aboard so we could get to know each other better. In a movement too swift for the eyes to follow he was off the paper and on my finger.

I lifted the finger to eye level and began watching him through a magnifying glass. For a few minutes he was very quiet; perhaps he was planning what to do next. Then with the quick step so characteristic of flies, he began parading up and down the full length of my finger as if he were marching to the music of an invisible brass band. Now and then he would pause and then resume his parading. He gave the impression that he was having a perfectly wonderful time and hoped I was too.

In the midst of all the swift bodily movement he stopped abruptly, swung completely around, marched to the middle of the finger and began rubbing his legs over his head, causing it to bob briskly up and down in my direction. Assuming that this could be his way of expressing appreciation, and not to be outdone in good manners in my own house, especially by a fly, I began bowing just as politely back to him. I was grateful that none of the neighbors could see me through the windows.

Curious as to what his reactions might be, I abruptly tossed the little fellow into the air. It did not disturb him in the least; in fact he seemed to like it. He cruised slowly about just above my head, but when I pointed my finger up in his direction, down he came, landing on the fingertip as though he and I had been doing such things for a long time. I did this again and again; but every time he was tossed off he would always return to the extended finger and resume his parading, posturing and head-bobbing.

As we paused after one of these landings, I slowly reached over with another finger and touched him. He skidded a little even with the extreme gentleness of the touch, but he did not take off, nor did he show the least sign of fear. I began slowly stroking the edges of his wings and silently talking across to him. Not as to “a fly” With all the limiting and condemning things that we humans usually fasten on flies, but as to an intelligent fellow being. While the world all about us was deeply bogged in misunderstanding, fear and destruction, all was exceedingly well between that little housefly and me, at least for the time being.