Who are you?

Consider two men: the first, a city-dweller, the second a man of the country. Which one lives a happier life? The city-dweller awakes each morning to the unnatural blaring monotone of his alarm clock, and, dreary eyed, pulls himself into a tight, uncomfortable suit, the only appropriate garb for the city office. He rushes (and what for?) to catch his bus, his train, his subway that will deliver him into his compressed hell. He scarves down a meal of chemicals designed to clog his arteries and cut his life short. What does he do when he reaches his office? He simply fritters the day away, for what useful occupation can be had at an office desk? Yes, he appears busy, he works himself into a frenzy to deliver the latest news, write the latest reports, please his superior, but what has he actually accomplished? In what way has he furthered himself, and, for that matter, the human race? The modern man takes himself too seriously: he fears the consequences of the artificial deadline. He believes that what he does is of the utmost import and that the world cannot do without it. He never stops to consider that millions of people around the world, from the office worker in Chicago to the merchant in Calcutta, live this same frivolous existence, plodding through life and never stopping to consider all the options that await him if he would merely pick his head up. Many people, faced by a firing squad, would rather struggle in their bondage, than passively let bullets strike them dead.
Now, enter the second man. He is a woodsman, living in the shade of the alpine forest. He is skilled in all the natural trades: swimming, shooting, fishing, wood carving. Each morning, he is awoken at first dawn by the slant of the sun upon his face. He spends his days not furthering unknown others who reside in the upper offices of London and Geneva, but rather in furthering himself. He cuts his own wood for his own fires, his catches his own trout for his own meals. He has ample time for himself, but this time is not wasted in inane pastimes. The man of the woods reads, writes, contemplates life. He realizes how fortunate his existence is, how lucky he is to see Nature in all its wild beauty. He alone sees the rain pelting the empty fields with gray clouds stretching behind the towering wooded peaks. He alone sees the early morning mist hanging low in the forest valleys, he alone tastes the icy waters of the lonely Northern lake. And at the end of the day, when he settles in his blanket and looks up at the indigo sky, worlds away from sickly orange haze that overhangs the metropolis, he can list the tasks he has accomplished that day. He is able to say, “I’ve walked nine miles, cut eight cords of wood, caught three trout, felt the wind ruffle my hair, the sun beat my back.” What has the urbanite done in one day? Confronted with the question, he will probably forget what he had for lunch! And, in time, when the woodsman lays down to die, he can smile to himself and know he’s seen and felt the World: the fierce heat of summer, the quiet after a midwinter snow, a blue jay chirping in the beechwood on an early April morning, the purple evening sky in October after a blustery afternoon. The urbanite will die like a firework, creating bright, loud sparks and dimming, but never completely extinguishing for years, before meekly bowing out leaving stones unturned, paths untrodden. Only on the point of death will he see the hills outside his hospice window and stop to consider what might have been.
It is left to debate whether the city-dweller or woodsman is ultimately the happier man. To each his own, the adage goes. The urbanite could live a completely happy life as a well-to-do dandy. The woodsman could remain a pauper, roving from village to village in the countryside never finding satisfaction. But more important is which man is honest with himself, which man knows the world for what it is, in all its glory and meanness, which man sees what humanity was and what it will come to be, which man can grasp his destiny in his palm. Some say Polaris is brighter in the countryside.