Hummingbirds are independent.  They fly alone, but live contentedly.  Zooming in during early spring, they light in nearby white oaks and visit with my family and me occasionally.  They will leave their leafy shelter every fifteen minutes and suckle from the bird feeder hanging from the back-porch eaves.  Nature has taught them how to survive; and they are exceptionally good at it.

Territorial, they quite ably scare away most intruders with aggressiveness and the rapid rotation of their wings.  Swarms of bees, the size of a man's thumb, took up residence in a large azalea by the side of our house recently.  After smelling the hummingbird food, forty or fifty of them bombarded the back porch for a week or more.  No one could sit on the deck or, for that matter, maneuver within six feet of the feeder without being tormented.  Wasp spray had no affect on them.

The hummingbirds had sipped from their feeder peacefully and regularly before the bees came.  But, though they fought boldly to protect what was theirs, they eventually were forced by the bees' sheer numbers to move on and take up residence somewhere safer.  They have not returned, even though the bees disappeared after the azaleas stopped blooming.

Sometimes, like the hummingbirds, we must move on.  Accepting what we can't change and moving on is necessary to our peace of mind and to our happiness.  If, with all our hearts, we try to change unhealthy situations, but fail and fail, then we might have to face the truth that we cannot cope with them.  There is no shame in this.  If we must seek help, or can seek help, in overcoming or adjusting to whatever makes us miserable, perhaps we should.  And, there is no shame in this. 

 If, on the other hand, nothing we try works and we still are miserable, we might have no other choice but to move on and to put it behind us--and not look back.  But, good news!  Hope can still exist. What lies ahead could very well be the happiest moments of our lives. Hope is magical.  No matter what happened yesterday or what might happen tomorrow, we should hold fast to it.

               
          A SONG OF HOPE

   In time, a winter's snow melts
   And Spring smiles to brighten the sky;
   A storm's heavy rain ceases
   And sunshine makes the earth to dry.
   Sometimes darkness lingers,
   But light always follows;
   God wisely made it thus,
   To give us hope and rainbows.

           ~ Lighter of Candles