Sitting in a crowded carriage during rush hour on the Northern Line recently, I discovered that alongside my fellow passengers I was in the company of a fly. Unusual and unexpected. I'm not sure I've seen any on the tube before and it caused me to think about how it would have found its way down through the halls and tunnels and in through one of the doors, or inbetween-carriage windows.
I thought of how that single solitary fly represented a phenomenon most of us can relate to: finding oneself to be in an unfamiliar and possibly uncomfortable environment. For the fly, it struck me that the underground would comprise an incredibly hostile and alien landscape from which it might not possess the resources to escape. In any case, chances are, it would have been transported to a quite different destination to its point of departure.
Thoughts led to thoughts, and before I knew it, I was faced with a great many questions about flies' socialisation... Would it matter to this fly, that he found himself in High Barnet, having started in Morden?
How did a fly come to be on the black line in the first place? Of the 50 stations on the Northern line, 36 are underground, so there is a distinct possibility the fly came aboard at one of the overground stations.
More thoughts... Do flies sleep? Do we ever see 'baby' sized flies? Why not?
'Buzzing Around'
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