Why Did God Invent Bees?

I marvel every day at God’s incredible creation all around me, but when I get to heaven, I have a few questions for the Almighty. One of them will be, what was He thinking when He created bees? Oh, I know they pollinate the flowers and all that nature stuff, but God could have designed any number of bugs that could do that. Why did he have to give that assignment to these ill-tempered, scary buzzers with the miniature swords protruding from their backsides?

The front of our house is lined with azalea bushes. In the spring they bloom into the most beautiful pink blossoms. Sadly, the blooms only last about two or three weeks. However, the leafy bushes grow like wildfire all summer long. By August my azaleas have all grown into each other and formed a tangled mess of foliage. It’s time to drag myself out there to trim them up, rake out the clippings, bag them and take them to the street for pick-up. Usually it’s just a dreary job that takes about three hours of back aching work.

This year was a little different.

I had finished trimming about two thirds of the bushes with my electric trimmer, when I bent down to get the lower branches on one of the plants closest to the house. Suddenly I felt a stinging pain on my leg. It was a hot day and I was wearing shorts and a T-shirt. I jerked upward and discovered to my horror that I was surrounded by a swarm of bees. Angry bees at that. As I flung my trimmer and bolted out of the hedge, I was stung several times all over my body. They got me just beside the ear, both hands and both arms, on the back and on the leg.

Thankfully, I’m not one of those folks who has a toxic reaction to bee stings, but for about two hours I just hurt all over. It was like my brain couldn’t sort out which pain signal to acknowledge, so it just sort of rotated all the messages. Eventually, the pain subsided. Several of the stings swelled up a bit but at least they didn’t hurt any more. I thought I was past the worst of it. I was wrong.

Once the pain subsides, the itching begins. Relentless itching. I poured on all the creams and ointments, nothing helped. I only survived thanks to the blessings of Advil and Tylenol. I was miserable for about two days but felt better after a steroid shot from my doctor.

The bees had declared war, and I was willing to accept the challenge, so long as somebody else actually did the fighting of course. My daughter recommended a pest control guy whom I called. He came out the same day. His first question was “What kind of bees are they?” I calmly told him I was too busy shrieking bloody murder to stop and get a good description. I just pointed to the shrubs and whimpered “they’re in there somewhere.”

These bug guys tend to be very nice people, but they are either extremely brave, or just a little crazy. Without hesitation, he strutted into the shrubbery and started kicking the individual plants, hoping to roust up the bees and discover their home. Suddenly he darted out of the landscaping faster than a speeding bullet. “Found them!” he proclaimed. Sure enough, they were flowing like a river out of a chipmunk hole at the base of one of the shrubs, the one I was trimming when I got attacked. “Yellowjackets” he explained. “They love to nest in chipmunk holes, and stuff like vibrations really get them mad.”

Oh, you mean like the vibration of an electric trimmer shaking their world? That kind of vibration? Good to know. A little late, but good to know.

He said he was going to poison the hole with some sort of white powder. He told me to stay inside the house during the procedure. No problem. Way ahead of you. Afterward, he showed me the hole, as the bees were busily sampling the powder and, hopefully, taking some for the queen to sample. The bug man said the whole colony should be dead in a few days. Just give it some time.

That was in August. I’m giving it time. Plenty of time. Meanwhile, if you happen to drive by my house, please forgive the look of the front landscaping. The bushes are only about half trimmed. I’m working up the courage to get back out there and finish the job.

Maybe by Christmas.