The ant and the cheese

We're at this wonderful campsite in Northwood, New Hampshire, sitting beside a little pond with loads of frogs and tadpoles in the lily-pad-covered water.

But I have just spent a wonderful half-hour watching an ant work with mighty strength to move a piece of cheese that is larger than he across the stony ground. It has been a truly super-ant struggle.

I had dropped the shredded cheese last night under the picnic table. He spotted it and decided it was worth the effort to move this half-inch-long shred of cheese out and up the hill.

This is a great lesson for all of us. He moved that shred about eight feet. This, it seems to me, is the equivalent of a human adult dragging another human for about four or five miles. It's not an easy trek. The pine needles on the ground must seem like enormous tree trunks to him. He drops the cheese when he hits these obstacles. He scouts ways around the obstacle and returns to the cheese. Over the needles he goes.

Then, when he thinks all is well, another ant meets up with him and tries to take the cheese away. So he now has to fight for what is his. He has dissuaded three other ants from stealing his cheese.

He is up on the side of the hill now, pushing and shoving his cheese to the entrance to the anthill. It's a super-ant struggle against the odds.

And it's a lesson for all of us. Never, ever, ever surrender. When you are knocked down, get back up and fight on.

Good ant. I suppose this falls under the category of stopping and smelling the roses. Another joy of retirement.