Even though I have worked like a mad dog from Mars this past year (and the years before), I still feel that I have been somewhat lazy and have done next to nothing. I guess that comes from an upbringing when, as a child, my brother and I were always kept busy doing or learning something: school, homework, music conservatory, daily practice of the musical instrument, being a boyscout... Work vs. play.

It took me a lifetime to be kinder to myself and live my life in my own pace, but obviously, I'm my worst 'parent' as, in the background, the impression that I do nothing worthwhile is still looming...

Anyway, I was lying in my bed this morning, observing birds (warblers?) gayly hopping from one branch to another and drinking the water from the leaves.

And I thought: "How wonderful is it to be a tree. Whatever it is, whatever shape it has, it still have a full life of its own. Every leaf matters, birds need it, bees need, we need it."