To be honest, it’s not the bumblebee that is taking flight. It’s their distant cousin, the honeybee that seems to be deserting the planet in record numbers. So far, science is at a loss to explain why they’re leaving us to fend for ourselves. The latest theory is that the radiation emitted from cell phones causes their internal navigation systems to somehow go haywire. They’ve even come up with a name for it. It’s called Colony Collapse Disorder.
In an effort get to the bottom of this mass exodus, I contacted a prominent member of the honeybee community in search of an answer. Due to his stature within the colony and the sensitive nature of the issue, the bee would only speak to me under the condition that he remain anonymous.
I’ll respect his wishes.
Perhaps sensing that he was about to be ambushed with a series of loaded questions, at first the bee would offer up only a terse “No comment” to my inquiries. However, after we retired to a local watering hole and settled down over a few glasses of mead, he started to let his guard down. When I pressed further, here’s what he had to say :
”What difference does it make? We’re all gonna be toast soon anyway. Get out while you can.”
I thought to myself that maybe these bees knew more about what was going than they were letting on. Maybe they thought that by keeping it secret, they’d be better off. As a recently dearly departed friend might have said, “So it goes.”
In an idyllic setting somewhere near the Great Smoky Mountains at Virginia Tech University a lone gunman by the name of Cho Seung-hui went on a shooting rampage. When it was over, he had killed thirty two people, most of them students and wounded another fifteen before turning the gun on himself. In addition, he mailed a macabre video and typed manifesto outlining his intentions to NBC news in New York. Portions of it have been running constantly and it is presently being analyzed to see if anything could have been done to prevent this tragedy. Meanwhile, members of the press corps and politicians have chimed in with their two cents worth on the issue of gun control versus concealed carry laws and which is the better way to try and stave this off from happening again.
All the while, the names and ages of the dead scroll across the bottom of my television and their pictures grace the front page of my local newspaper.
In a land far far away, a series of car bombs exploded in and around Baghdad killing upwards of two hundred people and injuring scores of others. Here in America, their names won’t scroll across the television. There won’t be any public officials holding convocations and very few except for their loved ones who carry what’s left of them in plain brown coffins will remember them at all.
If it’s any consolation, today it was revealed that actor/comedian Alec Baldwin went on an extended rant to his eleven year old daughter that was recorded and published for all to hear. He signs off his tirade by calling her a “rude, thoughtless pig”.
He wasn't trying to be funny.
Somewhere in our nations capital Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was called to testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee about what role he might have played in the firing of eight United States District Attorneys. In the course of his testimony, he invoked the phrase “I don’t recall” or some variation thereof over seventy times.
His boss, the President of the United States, George W. Bush said he was “pleased” with Mr. Gonzales and how he performed in the front of the committee.
I hope my future boss holds me up to such high standards.
Somewhere on a beautiful spring evening in the middle of America, a group of twelve year old girls are getting ready to play their first soccer game of the season. They quickly go up by the score of 3-0 but the other team rallies and ties the game at three apiece with about four minutes left. Then, with a little over a minute remaining in the game, one of the girls scores what turns out to be the winning goal.
I don’t know if there’s a more beautiful sight in the world than that of a child or a group of children who wear an expression of joy when they realized that they accomplished something.
I hope the honeybees take that into consideration when they decide what their next move is going to be.
So it goes.