Brian Doyle’s “Joyas Volardores” is a short writing piece representing the different ways we as humans may go about living out our lives. Doyle’s repetition of talking about hearts emphasizes the importance of living and the way we choose to do so. He does not say that any one way is right or wrong, just gives examples of these different people and lives. He uses descriptions of the hearts of different animals to express different lifestyles of different people.

In the first paragraphs, Doyle uses the metaphor of a hummingbird to represent the types of people who live their life quickly, always in a hurry, moving around and on the go, always with something to do and somewhere to be. He explains the hummingbird’s heart, telling about its incredibly small size the rapid speed at which it beats, ten times a second. The hummingbird is a quick animal, always on the go and rarely stopping. Doyle says that they can dive at sixty miles an hour or fly 500 miles without stopping to rest, but that when they do, they can come near death. These tiny animals live their lives out hard but this also means that they burn themselves out very quickly and very easily. The hummingbird in this piece is used to represent one lifestyle to live that’s on an extreme end of a spectrum.

He also goes on to talk about the largest heart in the world, that of the blue whale, explaining that it is the size of a room, four chambers that a child could stand comfortably inside. But although these are the largest, most powerful animals on earth, we know nearly nothing about them. They’re sort of mysterious creatures, and this, too is another way that people can live. Keeping to themselves and not really letting anyone in. But one thing we do know about these animals is that they travel in pairs. This may be a way of Doyle hinting at the idea of love. We know nearly nothing about them other than this, This could be suggesting another lifestyle of people who are in love, letting in only the person that they love but remaining secretive to the rest of the world around.

An example of a way to live that’s used to represent the opposite end of the spectrum from the hummingbird is that of a tortoise. Unlike the hummingbird, the tortoise moves around extremely slowly, rather than hustling and bustling around at all times. Doyle says that each animal has about two million heart beats in a lifetime, and you get to choose how you spend them. The hummingbird burns through his in about two years whereas the tortoise spreads those out to make them last up to about two hundred. It’s the way you decide to spend these heartbeats that defines your life.

Doyle ends his essay talking about a human heart, the same heart that we all have. He compares it to a house and says that everyone is living in their own house of a heart alone, never really letting anyone in. He says that we choose who is allowed into the house and let them in by opening windows, but at the end of the day everyone really is in that house all alone. This is because we’re afraid of being hurt when we let people into the house. If you’re in that house all alone, then there is nobody there to hurt you. It’s all about being vulnerable. Whether you choose to live out your life like the hummingbird or the blue whale or the tortoise, you’ll always be living in that house alone because nobody wants to get hurt.

I believe Doyle is really talking about the human heart throughout the entire piece. The hearts and lives of these other animals are all just metaphors being used to describe different aspects or types of people. It almost gives a bit of a reality check. If you were to realize you’re living like the hummingbird and are about to burn out, this may help you realize you need to start living a little more like the tortoise, or if you’re living like the tortoise you may need to realize you need to start living a little more like the hummingbird. It’s all about finding the balance and the best way to spend your two million heartbeats