I set out a few days ago to make the most of another gorgeous Florida day. The skies were clear and blue and I had a crack in my schedule that allowed me to make the most of it.
It has been a challenging time of late and finding time for things I love to do has been a bit of an issue, to put it mildly.
So heading down to Circle B and hitting a trail down by Lake Hancock, reacquainted me with myself as much as with the sights and creatures that abound there.
I took the big gun (the 600 mm lens) and even though I didn’t use the tripod, I managed to control it enough to get some decent shots.
I’ve added them here at the end of the blog along with a picture of Coco who was just relaxing in a gravy lovers tray when I got back and a first shot of TC … he is the newest visitor to come by for food. That makes eleven cats at my place (in case you’re counting).
Anyway, hope you enjoy!
So, it was a day or so later, when I found myself trying to help a little moth that had been chased by the cats, that today’s thought first occurred to me.
The little guy had been chased indoors and had taken a few paw swipes by the time I got to him. But, I picked him up and brought him outside to the evening air and put him on the railing just outside the front door.
He was walking but a bit unsteady, so I looked up online what to feed a moth and the answer was mostly liquid, with high sugar content. Being a bad eater, I had no fruit at the house but I did have syrup. (You can tell I like pancakes by my waistline.)
To cut a long story short, I poured a couple teaspoons of it onto a small piece of plastic and then helped him near it so he could have a drink.
But the poor little guy walked into it and almost drowned in the syrup. I managed to get him back out but now he had a real coating of the stuff all over him as he walked away.
I went back in home defeated and tried to console myself that I had good intentions. But sometimes, despite the best of intentions we not only fail … we can make matters worse.
I love living creatures. Try my very best to kill no-one and if I come across an injured creature, I will extend myself to try to help.
But sometimes, life doesn’t want our help and in this case (as Morgan put it so eloquently) I IHOP-ed the poor guy up nicely for someone out looking for a maple-flavored snack.
Our intentions will often fall apart in circumstances where we try to have a positive impact. For example, how often have you heard of someone trying to break up a fight only to be shot or stabbed?
I know that is a rather dramatic example, but it does happen. And we have to be ready for it.
Because inside our heads we search for things we can affect. Perhaps even control. We think that if we put the right effort in, then the right result will happen.
Unfortunately that isn’t true and life has a way of reminding us of our own triviality in how life plays out.
So much of life weaves its way without our intervention and while it finds a path that may not be one we would choose, we are really quite irrelevant to the end result.
Yes, there are definitely times when we can have a positive impact on things around us but sometimes we just can’t.
Our inability to create our preferred result should not deter us from trying. It is the trying that occasionally brings small victories our way or a better life to those around us. Without such efforts life would devolve into an uncaring passage of time that goes from start to finish in a straight line.
We can and do alter the course of things around us. When we alter the course of an animal’s life in a positive manner, we elevate our own in the process. Our purpose for having existed in the first place is validated and if done so unselfishly, then all the better!
But just as in my maple-flavored moth experience, sometimes we just miss. We can revisit it in our heads and second guess other things we could have done, but at the end of the day we have to recognize that we are not gods.
We do not roll the dice and yet we must follow how they roll.
… just a thought!
