The Hiatus Bloom Is Fading

Today I may sound a little wistful, as I feel that I could be lost in my own thoughts, with some regrets about the way my hiatus is going.

When I start comparing my hiatus with others, like I was doing yesterday, that's a thing of pride. Then when that takes hold, it's not long, obviously, before my self identification is wrapped up in a particular aspect of my day to day life, in this case my hiatus. Very dangerous.

Why do we pin our hopes on such fleeting nonsense, externals? I can't be known simply for my hiatus. Someday the newspaper will say, "Local Man On Hiatus Dies." That's ridiculous. So I shouldn't be comparing myself to others and feeling lifted up over them simply because I've taken time off and have made a big deal out of it. Need to get away from that.

Today I'm thinking rationally. Yesterday I was lost in the rarefied mist that encircles my citadel. I was up there looking down on the small, small world. And when you do that, everything up there seems a lot bigger. So much so that my pride got the best of me. When the fact of the matter is very clear, that this hiatus is actually consuming me. I'm going to have to try to break it off. But maybe its hold is already too great.

The bloom is definitely fading. That's flower language. That's language that florists, botanists, gardeners, and undertakers understand. A flower is nature's most fleeting child. That's why you never see a well rested bee. They know if they're not up 24/7 the flower's going to be gone. They have to suck the juice while it's there. Because tomorrow it'll be shriveled like a prune. (Maybe that's why flowers shrivel so fast. The bees are too anxious and are sucking the lives out of them unnecessarily, lest they shrivel. So if we could reeducate bees, maybe flowers would last longer.)

I've been amazed over the years about the lifespan of flowers. It could be, like me, that it has nothing to do with anxious bees. It could simply be the penalty for pride is universal. Who's more prideful than a flower? They've got their bright, gay colors, happy-go-lucky attitude, cock of the walk struttin', talking trash to the weeds to the left and right. They think they're really bad (meaning really good). But then the bees come swooping in, nature's pride police, looking for the proudest flowers, and those they suck dry first. That's why you never see a well rested bee, because there's so many proud flowers to kill.

Or another possibility, and this one could be the best, is that flowers know when to give up a good thing. Unlike me. I get something and I keep it till I'm dust and it'll still be on the shelf. Like my hiatus. I've got it, then it's got me. I tend to it, keep it well preserved, exalt it, parade it around, display it, brag about it, and dis other people who have a lesser hiatus simply to make myself look more important. But not the flowers. The flowers think, "We are beautiful, but we must not glory in our beauty. We must simply be a cog in the great machinery of nature. And if we become exalted, or are tempted toward the same, we must willingly fade and fall, the quicker the better."

If flowers give up their lives like that, to avoid pride, we're back to the anxious bee theory. The bees need that flower juice for their young. So they're sucking like their lives depend on it, because they do! Those would be the largest number of bees. Then there's a few bees -- almost like monk bees -- who have foregone families and providing for families. It is their task in life to suck flowers only to kill them off with mercy. For monk bees know the flowers' plight, being so beautiful, yet eschewing pride. They come swooping in, their monk habits, cowls, and whips trailing after them and making flight extremely difficult. And that's why you never see a well rested monk bee. (But they like it that way.)

Well, nature has its way -- and I have mine. I hope to live and learn, and to know when the bloom has faded and when to give it up. But right now I'm too much in the grasp of something ... my hiatus ... and I can't give up now, faded bloom or not.