Everybody's doing it

Birds do it and bees do it. Houseflies do it too.

I was reading the Globe in Ryan Playground this morning when a pair of flies landed on the comics page. These flies were attached, and not at the hip. They landed right smack on the middle panel of "Get Fuzzy." They rolled around a bit, buzzing contentedly the whole time, and then flipped over to interrupt my reading "Arlo."

Feeling voyeuristic but not having much choice since they were determined to take their shenanigans to wherever I diverted my eyes, I watched the couple with growing interest. It wasn't pornographic and it certainly wasn't anything anyone would buy a ticket to see. The smaller fly clung onto the larger one's backside. The larger one buzzed her wings in a flurry and moved the couple a few inches away, rested, and did it again. The smaller one didn't move much. He was what's called a 'lazy lover'.

This went on for ten minutes and finally, since the drama was lacking climax and I was getting antsy to check out today's celebrity news on the the back page of the Metro Section, I brushed the conjugal pair away with my hand. With the momentum I gave them, they buzzed on the female's pinions into the grass a few feet away to continue thier housefly pleasures.

I washed that hand as soon as I got to work. It just didn't feel clean.

Boston is a big, crowded city. You never know what behavior you're going to witness when you leave your house. Some of it is in good taste. Some of it makes you wish what happens in public were kept a little more private. The flies didn't seem the least bit embarassed as much as I blushed at their public display of affection.