Life finds a Way

Dr. Malcolm in Jurassic Park warned of dinosaurs multiplying even though they were all “created” as male. He simply said “life finds a way.”

When the kids were young we lived in a town where it just wasn’t the right thing to do to have farm animals so we settled for fish and Gerbils. We had a wall full of fish, nine tanks, and in one tank we attempted to breed minnows or gold fish to feed a huge clown-fish we had in another tank. All of our attempts at causing an increase in the population of minnows didn’t work and we had to frequent the Pet Store to get our food supply. After a while the electrical cost of nine tanks, filters, heaters, lights, and bubblers got a little too much for me AND my budget. Life didn’t find a way with fish. But then again, that clown-fish never went hungry.

Our next attempt was with Gerbils. My kids and I looked at all the cool tunnels, rooms and exercise equipment in the Gerbil habitats and the engineer in us got the better of us. Fortunately the budget limited our Gerbil city to a few cages and tunnels to start out with but we were ready for the residents. We bought two Gerbils to populate our city and the Pet Shop attendant assured me that they were both male, after looking at their furry undersides. We cheerfully brought them home and watched them run from space to space, chewing up toilet paper rolls and building nests to sleep. One day, a few weeks later, one the kids said, “Um, dad, there’s baby Gerbil’s in the cage. How can they do that if both are males?” I successfully fended off the “birds and bees” question in favor of seeing how cool the 6 little Gerbils would be. We went to the Pet Store and bought a few more tunnels and rooms for our habitat and watched them grow. It wasn’t long, seemingly days, and we had a population problem in our habitat. Life was definitely finding a way! Before I could implement some population control measures the flurry of activity in the habitat produced a loose tunnel and they took over our basement. I had to do something before they took over the house and I did; at least I think I did, I wouldn’t be surprised if the new owners of our house still find them hiding in the old farm house basement. Life finds a way.

We humans deceive ourselves into believing that we are in control. Whether we are breeding dinosaurs or gerbils, we REALLY are not in control. Life finds a way. I pay hundreds of dollars a year for pest control around my house and yet my wife Frankie freaks out when she has to use the restroom at night because she found a small scorpion on the wall of our bedroom one morning.

We kill bugs one way and they develop a resistance so we kill them another way, then a new bug moves in because its enemy was just killed by you. Life finds a way. We are not in control. I am sure the Egyptians had their bug killers just like their snake handlers but it was soon proved they were not in control either. Life finds a way, just like the author of that life.