The Grasshopper and The Ant

Remember the story of the ant and the grasshopper?

It was summer, glorious summer. After a cold wet winter, Grasshopper was delighted to be spending the day singing and fiddling, hanging out with his pals, and enjoying spur of the moment sunset hikes up Mary's Peak. He loved laying in his hammock watching the moon rise, and sleeping through the hot parts of the day in the shady cool. He loved hanging out at the farmer's market, sampling the seasonal produce. He loved gleaning at town picnics. And he never turned his kid's requests for a trip to the river to take a dip, or a walk to the park to pitch a ball.

With pity in his eyes, he watched Ant, scurrying back and forth gathering food for the winter. What was the point of wasting such rare and beautiful days on nothing but work? "Hey!", he teased as she heaved past, lugging some morsel to her tunnel. "Stop already! Smell the roses!"

Ant glared at him in disgust. "SOME of us are busy. Some of us have work to do. Winter will come, and then where will you be?" Grasshopper just fiddled a tune and patted his round belly.

Winter did come, along with the drowning rains and then the cold. Grasshopper was fine for a bit, living off the fat he'd packed on during the summer lazy days. But after a while, he grew hungry, and there was nothing to eat. He went looking for Ant.

"Ant", he said, "share some of that food. You have so much."

"Forget it, buster. While you fiddled, ate and lazed, I worked to have food for these hard times. I left my babies to find it. I forsook the contra dances. I missed the sunsets you said were so fantastic on Mary's Peak. I didn't even get to see my kid's baseball games, because I had important work to do. And if you think your lazy butt will profit from all my sacrifice, you got another think coming."

At the end of this soliloquy, Ant keeled over from a sudden and massive coronary.
Grasshopper fully intended to mourn the moment, but was too weak from hunger, and passed out instead.

The moral of the story is:

MODERATION IN ALL THINGS. Including work and play.

Here's to balance--
Jana