July 3, 1997

Picture being stuck in traffic on a scorching hot highway, desperately trying to shut the windows of your car to escape the annoying floating shower of insects we know today as Love Bugs. Anyone living in Florida for a while experiences this phenomena. For the nine years I've lived in the sunshine state, I have observed changes in this bug/insect/creature, and I have some questions about its existence...What is the purpose of its creation and its place within the realm of higher workings of the universe???

I remember when... years ago...

• Love Bugs were huge and they floated in pairs as if in a state of copulatory bliss (hence the name, I can only assume).

• I know they mate during certain times of the year. (Specific seasonal data I can't recall, but I can remember that it was too hot to drive around in mid-afternoon with my windows up and no air conditioning in my car.)

• Love Bugs were genetically constructed by scientists in a higher education facility located within Florida, to create some "thing" to eat mosquitos, I guess, or maybe love them to death. I am not exactly sure of the premise of the experiment, but we have love bugs. (I can't imagine that they are still creating them - maybe trying, trying to perfect them, and different strains are being created).

• Love Bugs have changed form from nine years ago: they are no longer as huge. Their wings are smaller, and they do not loft around coupled in large masses. (We just don't have to wash them off our windshields like we used to)...

• Are they becoming extinct?

• Their earthly body form is changing generationally (sort of like when people told you that in time our baby toes and our appendix will not be a part of human anatomy because we have no real use for them).

• Don't they love each other like they used to? They don't seem to fly around in couples like before.

• Should we change their name to fit Love Bugs' new behavioral patterns...say maybe call them Divorced Bugs or Low Libido Bugs, or maybe they have just become celibate.

• At any rate they don't look as healthy and full of stamina as before, and soon, through natural genetic laws, they will cease to exist.

• Maybe they have decided to migrate to where the African Killer Bees come from...

• Are they trying to escape medical experimetation/mutation/observation?

• Or maybe they just don't like mosquitos, and scientists haven't designed them to eat anything else.

Stephanie Wyatt is an arts person who has made the transition to new media. She is Orlando's leading authority on Love Bugs. Other Articles I've Written