Flights of Fancy & Flights of Purpose Each in Their Own Time

Hmmm, in this fast-paced, hurry-up-or-be-left-behind society in which we live, how do we squeeze the most of each day without shortchanging tomorrow?

I've become increasingly aware in the last year or two of the fragility of life and our tenuous grip on it. It seems like every day something happens to remind me and raises the ante on what I ought to experience before my head hits the pillow again.

Cancer. Is there a more humbling and disconcerting reality check than the increasing prevalence of this unforgiving disease? In the last year or two, several people that I know have received the diagnosis. Thankfully most of them were diagnosed in time to be treated and recover. But a few are not so fortunate.

I'm heartened that medical research has made steady advances in treating cancer. But there still is no cure. If ever there was a definitive argument for living in the moment, surely – I tell myself – cancer is it.

And there are so many other things that make tomorrow a worrisome uncertainty. The earthquake in Japan. An uneasy world economy that seems destined to forever spin on the head of a pin and tumble on a moment's notice. Mass murders in Norway. The city of Slave Lake destroyed by wildfires. I could go on and on.

At times it seems that I should throw caution to the wind and squeeze every last drop out of today. Why worry about a tomorrow with such uncertainty hovering around it?

I try that approach now and then. Grabbing everything I can get from the moment I wake to the moment I fall asleep. "Live like you were dying", as the popular country song suggests. It works for a little while. But I simply don't have the energy to sustain that frenetic pace. The thrill ride runs out of gas all too quickly.

So I try the flip side of the coin. Take a day and choose to simply do nothing of any consequence. Kick back, relax and let the rest of the world go madly on past me. Be serene and purposefully inactive. But very quickly the "to do" items pile up and I realize I'm stealing my serenity at tomorrow's expense.

Always I arrive at the same conclusion. I can't outrun the dangers that may be waiting around the next corner. Nor can I close the doors and pretend that they don't exist. The secret formula– to the extent that it exists at all – must lie in the art of balance.

It seems to me that those people who are truly happy and serene are those who have found equilibrium. They celebrate the joys that come their way without delay. But they also work to plant the seeds for tomorrow knowing that each of us has to earn our way every day.

I often turn to nature for my metaphors and find myself doing so again.

One my favourite dragonflies is the Darner. Darners are constant fliers. On a scorching hot summer day, you'll see them patrolling a meadow in seemingly endless, untiring flights. Back and forth. Up and down. In loops and spirals. Even hovering occasionally.

But when a darner perchs, it will stay put for some time. Hanging patiently from a branch in what seems to be perfect rest.

I aspire to live my life by the Darner Metaphor. Long and industrious flights. Flights of fancy and flights of purpose. Making the most of sunny afternoons. Resting when the moment calls for it. But always aware that equilibrium is of my own making and that I must never stop working at it until my head falls upon the pillow for the last time.

~ Michael Robert Dyet is the author of "Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel" – double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael's website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com or the novel online companion at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog. Visit www.smashwords.com to download a free preview of the e-book version.

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