In a few days we will be on vacation. It's a simple trip to see a place we used to call home, visit family and friends, and get away from our normal routines. It will also signify the first time I declaredly will not check my e-mail during a break.

For those not aware of my tendencies with regards to technology, I obsessively look over my e-mail. This happens for a reason - I have avoided many a nasty, or at least inconvenient, surprise by staying on top of things. Yet, when in the past several days my mood has shifted suddenly over trivialities, or I have taken slightly annoying occurrences as personal slights, all of which have made the need to seek a counter-balance to my usual patterns that much more apparent.

The whole experience has reminded me of the idea that in every system there must exist an equilibrium - its lack will show in unexpected and dubious ways. A topic that comes up often in academic culture, and particularly in academic professional publications, the "work-life" balance takes center stage when we find ourselves forced to confront our deepest fear ... that we cannot continue full speed all the time without part of our emotional stability and overall psyche giving in. You can rest assured that I've arrived at that faceless, lonely, and disheartening precipice before (as many of us have and will again) and have no intention of looking out again upon the wastelands its perilous presence engenders. In essence, each element of one's mind must find harmony with its antithesis, and as such within itself.

Miguel Torga hints at the fragile, yet necessary, scale of opposites such an approach warrants in the first stanza of his poem titled "Agora":

Abre-te, Primavera!
Tenho um poema à espera
do teu sorriso.
Um poema indeciso
entre a coragem e a covardia.
Um poema de lírica alegria
refreada,
a temer ser tardia
e ser antecipada

...

The opposing forces of cowardess and courage, of the fear of both arriving expectedly and too late, play into an ambivalence which opens the door to the world's beauty and opportunities for prosperity for the poetic subject.  The former seems more clear-cut, since one can imagine in concrete terms the dichotomy the opposition engenders. The latter, on the other hand, requires a certain pre-existing knowledge of the self in order that its significance contribute to the reader's understanding of the poem's true message. This awareness of fear, and of its illogical, although entirely explicable, existence, offers the poetic subject and reader a nuanced and fulfilling resolution to the conflict the various elements of the poem seem superficially to nurture into a place of doubt and self-loathing. They do not respond to a need, but hint at one.

With this, I wish you a good evening and a restful end to the summer. Have a great night / Tenham uma boa noite / que paséis unas buenas noches.