She grew up in a hive, a vast, endeavoring conglomeration that stretched from here to there and beyond. The scope of its distance was too far to see. The wealth of effort and sacrifice and unappreciated toil encompassed not only her lifetime but lifetimes before hers – each life, comparatively short., but the lifetimes together stretched into eons. The hive surged with effort; effort of mothers, of fathers, of brothers, sisters, of husbands, of wives, of soldiers and drones. And though it was true, there was a bounty of sweetness, every day demanded more. In trying to calculate how she could escape and still remain faithful, useful, loyal and loved, she failed. She wasn’t good at math and the formula to keep her wings a flutter seemed beyond her capacity to sustain. The hive was a place where enough was never enough and she grieved at her lack. Stepping out of the hive wasn’t her idea. Indeed she would have never gone if she hadn’t been pushed. The miracle of her exit remains. She is grateful and ambivalent. The hive had clear and precise measurements. This equals that. That equals this. Outside the hive the measurements were all askew, up for grabs. What was she worth outside of the hive? Some days her life looked like honey. Some days it looked like sloth.