Procrastination Can Have Its Bad Points

In my roughly half-century of life I have made the following observation: Procrastination can have its bad points.  As one of the finer procrastinators I have ever known, I am highly qualified to comment in this regard. As concerns the gift of procrastination, I am the Picasso of the Put-It-Off-For-Laters (If Ever).  If we procrastinators earned the level of income ascribed to our paint-brush sweeping counterparts, we would be a rich group of people, if we ever got to the bank to cash our checks.  But occasionally, procrastination has its bad side.

In example of this observation, I would like to relate the following incident that is taken straight from the pages of my life.  Saturday, last, my spouse and I made a foray the swimming pool.  My wife went directly to the cool water and jumped right in.  I, on the other hand, found a nice sunning chair under some tree cover and sat down.  Once properly seated in comfort, I began contemplating as to going swimming myself.  Now, as you may know, tree cover in West Texas is extremely rare, but at the swimming pool, several trees are placed strategically as to make another rarity in West Texas - shade.

While lost in the contemplation as to the possibility of going swimming (today) I became aware of some bird, a hummingbird, flitting swiftly from branch to branch and chittering in a most agitated manner.  As I watched this little bird, I noticed that occasionally it landed on a branch not far from my chair.  Then it would flit away again, jetting from limb to limb.  I began scanning the tree cover trying to ascertain the cause of the hummingbird's irritation.  While searching the trees, I noticed that a branch just over my chair had some sort of half-sphere of mud and twigs adhered to it.  Protruding from the top of the half mud-ball were three thorns.  As I watched, the thorns suddenly opened in beak like fashion, and I realized that there were feathers attached to the thorns.  Then it hit me.  I was seated directly under a hummingbird nest, and the nest was occupied by three little hummimgbird children.  In fact I was the cause of the mother (let's be fair - it could have been a father) hummingbird's agitation.  I pointed out this little wonder of nature to my spouse, then quietly retreated to a farther part of the pool.  The little hummingbird was able to go about it's business, which I believe was to feed the three hummingbird children.

As I pondered this true wonder of nature (I had never seen an occupied hummingbird nest in the wild) I commented to my spouse that I should take a picture of the wonders to which we had been treated.  She said, "You better do it quick!.  Those little birds look like they are about ready to leave the nest."  I said, "I will do it tomorrow.  I don't want to walk all the way back to the apartment to get the camera."  Well, tomorrow came and went, then two days passed, and life continued "business as usual."  But yesterday I raced back to the swimming pool with my trusty camera.  To my horror, there was no hummingbird flitting around, and there were no little feathered thorns peeping over the sides of the little nest. Just quietness and an abandoned bird nest.

As I lamented the lost opportunity to get what could have been the photo of a lifetime, my wife's words came back to me.  "You better do it quick!"  The procrastinator's anti-motto.  But I had to admit, if I had taken the picture that day, I would not be sitting here now wishing I had done so. Were the little birds sent away from the nest the same day I saw them? Were they there the next day? In any case, I missed out on what, once again, would have been the picture of a lifetime.  And as much as I like Procrastination, it must be taken in moderation.  Otherwise, Procrastination can have its bad points.