I always find myself liking the grasshopper better than the ant in Aesop's Fable. The ant seems like a dull sort of fellow. Aways working and never any time for play.
Sure, sure. I get the message.....the moral......
"What!" cried the ant in surprise, "haven't you stored anything away for the winter? What in the world were you doing all last summer?"
The ant's just stingy. Surely the music and laughter that the grasshopper generated all summer earned him a little bit of the fruits of the ant's labor. Instead of viewing it as one extreme against the other - constant work vs. constant play - I prefer to think of it as two sides of a well balanced coin. What good is being well prepared for everything if there's no joy in it?
Sure the ant has food for the whole winter but what a boring meal it would be to actually sit down with that self righteous insect going on and on about how many grains he has stored away for the winter. Berating me for not having the same foresight and fortitude as him. I bet he hasn't laughed in years. Bah!
I'd much rather pour a glass of wine and sit down with the cheerful grasshopper. I'm sure he'd start off with a happy song on his fiddle and then move onto an entertaining tale. Well worth the price of admission.
Life is too short to suck all the fun out of it at every step.
Life's yen and yang. It takes both laughter and work to make a happy life.
ReplyDeleteYes it's certainly a balancing act, something I learned a bit too late.
ReplyDeletea loaf of bread a jug of wine and thou beside me..pretty soon I'll be fat drunk and in trouble.
ReplyDeleteWouldn't the world be a better place if we embraced each other's differences instead of trying to fit everything into our idea of what things should be??
ReplyDeleteHi Christine,
ReplyDeleteGreat post, you are so right.
Love,
Herrad