What the SQUIRRELS Taught Me.

Out for a walk this morning. The weather did a major turn-around..it was cold. But the little black squirrels were scurrying around hiding their winter supply of nuts before the snow falls. Now they have good reason to rush and store their nuts! Their life depends upon it.

Years ago, soon after I moved back to Toronto, I received a call from a colleague I worked with in the publishing business in Dayton, Ohio. He asked me if I would be willing to come to a meeting at a hotel on the West side of Toronto. He was interested in a project I had developed that would reduce the cost of college and university text books.

I put on my best suit and tie, hopped in the car and worked my way across town. I arrived at the hotel and went to the front desk asking directions to Room #105. Unfortunately, the traffic was funereal  and I was a few minutes late.

I rushed down the steps into the lower corridor walking full steam in search of Room #105. I did not see the tempered glass partition dividing the hallway into two sections! I walked right through the glass sending sparkling pieces in all directions. People on the other side stopped and stared at this stranger as he exploded through the scattering shards of glass clutching a briefcase. They were shocked - I didn't  know what hit me! I escaped without a scratch and continued on my way. How was I to know there was a glass wall in the middle of a dim hotel hallway?

In this case rushing was necessary. I was late for an important meeting and wanted to make a good impression. But it is easy to get into the rushing mode, even when there is no urgent need to surge. For many, impetuosity becomes an unconscious habit.  Some would say the worst offenders are the Type-A Personality group. You meet them in the work-place...anxious, workaholics, tied to their devices, high achieving types.  But I would venture to say this 'hurry-sickness' has spread a bit since I was gainfully employed.

I still find myself at times rushing, not taking the time to enjoy the moment as if the next moment would be more important. I can't wait to get the task finished even when I have no need to hurry. One of the expressions I found myself using after retirement was, " I am so busy I don't know when I had time to work". Work habits cling like dust particles in the sun streaks of a closed-up room. Yet, try to drive leisurely on highway #401 and you will know what I mean!

Rushing is an unnecessary stress, but in today's fast moving world, surrounded by our devices, stress seems inevitable. I heard it said rushing is a survival technique first developed in the ancient world. It was called 'fight or flight'. When confronted with a dinosaur either you trusted your mighty club or you ran like hell! Modern life seems to activate this ancient stress response.

Charlie Chaplin tied up in TIME!

I like to think that when people migrated away from the land during the Industrial Revolution, in the mid 1800's, and moved into the world of systematic production they also moved into 'machine time'.  As an octogenarian I do remember Charlie Chaplin and the movie "Modern Times". The dependence on clocks and computers has become more serious and today we have become extracted from nature and plunked into Cybertime.

We now have what is called ecopsychology, the study of the relationship between people and the natural world. They are finding that stressful souls can find some peace by just taking a good walk in the woods. Excuse the simplification on my part!

I find a pleasant walk, exercise, sailing (can get you mighty close to nature!) and a host of other actions can drag me away from my watch and devices and keep me grounded. But, not matter how hard I try, I somehow seem to get tugged back into our mechanistic world.

Perhaps I should follow the example of the little black squirrels and settle peacefully into our  condominium with my devices and wait out the winter! No, I just have to get out there and enjoy the world as it is. But I do need to constantly remind myself that the machines that surround me can draw me off my target. I want to be careful the surrounding technology does not totally disconnect me from the realities of the natural world.

And that's Dick's View of the World this Week