04 Jul Goodnight, Old Bee
While taking an evening walk, I noticed a bee resting on a bright red rose. The sky was darkening, and the bee, nestled in the delicate petals, seemed out of place, as if he had missed the call to return to his hive.
Bees are the hardest little workers. They labor tirelessly and purposefully from dawn to dusk. In their 30-day lifespan, they produce a mere teaspoon of honey. It is their life’s work.
I was curious about why a bee would linger in a flower rather than return to its hive at day’s end, so I looked it up when I got home. I discovered that bees out past dusk are ones that sense that the end of their life is near.
These elder bees often don’t return to their hives at the end of the day. Instead, they choose to spend their final night on a flower. And if they are lucky enough to wake up the next day, they simply resume their task of collecting pollen or nectar for the colony.
I thought about the way the bee chooses to spend its last moments in the embrace of a beautiful flower. It reminds me of the advice so many people give near the end of their life:
Enjoy the beauty of what’s around you.
Do more of what makes you happy.
Don’t forget to stop and smell the roses.
I hope that little bee wakes to see another sunrise. But if not, I hope he enjoys his final night enjoying the beauty that surrounds him, looking up at the stars, as he gently falls asleep in the fragrant petals of the rose.
The place he knows best.
Goodnight, old bee.