A chrysalis (Latin: chrysallis, from Ancient Greek: χρυσαλλίς, chrysallís, plural: chrysalides, also known as an aurelia) or nympha is the pupal stage of butterflies. The term is derived from the metallic–gold coloration found in the pupae of many butterflies, referred to by the Ancient Greek term χρυσός(chrysós) for gold.

Each of us bursts into society with nothing more to hang onto than our gumption, notions we have for engagement of ourselves with others or for our personal advancement. The car that we drive, the office that we run, the real estate that we own or the political alliances that we cultivate are mere moorings along the road we travel. They are attempts to categorize our resourcefulness and stewardship, our shrewd and spirited initiative. The people whom we meet or love or with whom we align by any other standard are piers or barques upon the sea of our uncertain voyage or within our fleeting harbours.

The profit and issue of commercial and romantic adventures arise as marks of our influence, territory and serendipity. Many of the distinctions are no more than consequence or favour blowing in the wind, alighting sometimes happily and for a prolonged period; at other times more transiently though frequently with as much colour or blossom and fate.

The applications we explore along the path (that is, the manner and variety of ways in which we express ourselves) succeed or not to capture our continuing interest depending upon not only the rewards or other noticeable manifestations but also upon connection with the universe of our inner lining, those deeply embedded seams of persuasion that characterize what makes us work and who we are. It matters not whether one is a movie star, a famous scientist, a successful entrepreneur or any everyday commoner because nothing guarantees life, resolve or bounty. Our surroundings may be a castle or a cabin; our sustaining memories may be lubricants or clogs; our present may be our past or our future.

Now as I approach the end of my life I am bridled only by the desire to savour what is at hand. No longer is it imperative to investigate, to travel, to do anything more than punctuate and marvel. I have visited famous cities; I have wintered on barrier islands; I have stayed in remote retreats atop a mountain; I have discovered islands in the sea. The time has come to acknowledge the incapacity for consumption of the whole; and instead to sense the shifting local breeze and alternate seasons; to rejoice in the material highlights that remain; to question only the magnificence of how it all transpired and to abandon the destiny of the flow to follow; to relish the rooms in which I now reside, the paintings on the wall, the rugs underfoot and the windows from which I regard the proximate world beyond. There is only so much; it isn’t a race or a score card.

How otherwise shall I make an assessment of 75 years out of the chrysalis? By what otherwise shall I evaluate the consequence of my tour or my outcome? When otherwise am I enabled to sit aside and remark upon the view from ashore? My world now envelops me with its boundaries which I have created or endured.  The words of Ecclesiastes surround me with a flimsy gauze that defines a universe beyond. Meanwhile my perishing limbs and arthritic frame incrementally limit and conclude the focus. As predicted the dissolution of the whole to dust is underway.

But I have for now preserved one last flight on the wing across the meadow and over the placid surface of the flowing river. I have the memories of moments spent wandering and building, insinuating and removing, capturing and editing, silently slipping along a ribbon of highway through the mountains or dining by the fire.