Birds of Paradise
NOTE: I wrote this blog in January of 2018 during a particularly difficult season of life. At the time, I had no idea that I was just 10 months shy of meeting the man of my dreams. I rediscovered this blog this morning, and, though, it’s no longer my current purview, I think it may be useful to those stuck in similar seasons of life. Hold on, friends. Hope springs eternal.
January 9, 2018
Generally speaking, the algorithm that generates Facebook memories on my daily timeline is on point. I appreciate the opportunity to reflect on that trip to South Africa 10 years ago or the Oompa Loompa Halloween costumes I forced upon my children a few years back. Joy, they say, is a matter of gratitude, and memories like this are worth the recollection.
But last week the algorithm failed me. On Tuesday, I rose before the sun, my sleep deprived eyes heavy and stinging, my insides heavy, a nervous jumble of grief, uncertainty, and quite frankly, dread.
I did not want to be doing this.
In fact, I had spent a significant amount of time over the past seven years avoiding it. “Seven. The number of completion,” I coached myself. “The Lord knows your heart. He promised never to leave you. Tell the truth, and trust Him. You CAN do this.”
My feet reluctantly hit the carpet as I reached for my phone to distract myself from my own anxiety. Facebook is pretty good for that, if you hadn’t noticed. Sometimes it’s too good. I began scrolling and paused abruptly.
“Here’s your memory from eight years ago,” my screen informed me.
I flinched the same way one might respond to unexpected heavy pressure on a sensitive bruise. Today? Really?
The picture displayed a gorgeous bouquet of bright pink roses in a pretty glass vase wrapped in an expensive ribbon. I remember having been so thrilled at the hope they represented when he gave them to me, hope for a future as bright and lovely as they were, hope that they reflected a heart that valued my own.
This, of course, was not to be- a disappointment that weighed heavily on me as we drove in near silence to the courthouse. As reality would have it, our marriage wilted nearly as quickly as the flowers, and if I wanted to be really shamelessly cliche, I’d allude to the intensity of the thorns still piercing my heart some seven years later. Had I but known how many women there would be… or how it would feel to have one of his mistresses text me a picture of herself holding my newborn daughter in a Playboy onesie. Or how soul crushing it would be to buy a brand new sweater in hopes of looking pretty, only to have it ripped from my body one night when I required too much of him…
No. I didn’t want to remember the roses. They had been nothing more than a lie eagerly embraced by a scared and lonely single mom who desperately needed to believe someone would want to keep her, baggage and all.
It makes me sad to recall it, to be honest, and it did little to improve my mood as we continued our drive to the courthouse. My best friend rummaged through her purse and pulled out a Ziplock bag containing meat and cheese.
“Here, Kaeley. You need to eat this,” she said in a tone that forbade any resistance. I complied and focused on my breathing. There is something unspeakably unnerving about standing in front of a room of complete strangers to publicly relive some of the most painful and humiliating experiences of your adult life, desperately hoping they’ll believe you and that the judge will act accordingly. It really is like standing naked in front of a crowd while people scrutinize every inch of your body under a magnifying glass. It was a joyless situation, one I deeply regretted having to endure.
My friend broke the silence.
“Have you read much about the courtship rituals of birds of paradise?” she asked. I laughed out loud. Only this brilliant woman.
“Um, no,” I replied.
She went on to describe this amazingly complex process wherein the male birds essentially bent over backwards to impress the females in hopes of securing a mate. The males would stretch and preen and warble and contort, exhausting all their physical energy with a singular aim: proving themselves worthy of the female’s attention.
The females, it turns out, were exceptionally picky, as they knew that their selection of a mate would carry profound significance in terms of their own well-being and the overall quality of life of their offspring. A single song or dance (or bouquet of roses) wouldn’t even move the needle. They knew their worth. There would always be another suitor. Only the best would suffice.
What had seemed like such a random conversational topic was, in fact, my dear friend’s way of speaking truth to my weary, punch drunk soul. Time after time, she had watched me allow my insignificance complex to settle for table scraps when a five course banquet was an option.
There’s a verse in the Bible that reads, “He who is full loathes honey, but to him who is starving, even the bitter tastes sweet.” The problem with living in a place of starvation for too long is that a single breadcrumb can appear to be a five course meal. Too often we let life and the way wicked people treat us convince us we are paupers who need to beg for food instead of heirs of a King whose children are entitled to abundance. We forget our worth. We kill our need and our passion. We pick the first bird that warbles in our direction instead of holding out for the cream of the crop.
Eve’s curse has weighed heavily on me lately. I’m not meant to be alone forever. It’s been brutally hard to go out on the frontlines of political battlefields, get ripped to pieces, and have no one to hold me and tell me it’s going to be alright when I lay my head on the pillow at night. My son asks me at least once a week when I’m going to find him a dad. I feel that deficit for him. I grieve it. He deserves better. It’s legitimately my fault that he doesn’t have it.
As Sophocles says, “The sorrows we choose ourselves bring the fiercest pain.” I preferred the adage when it was little more than a calligraphed truism hanging in the wall of my high school English classroom. It was so much more obnoxious in real life relationship with it.
Writers are often told not to delve into the raw stuff until they’ve gotten some distance from it, but we all know how I feel about rules, and I’m just going to say it- I’m not the only single mom clawing her way through this stuff right now. Sometimes it’s enough to just know you’re not alone. And if, a few years down the road, Facebook reminds me of this note, and my first inclination is to cringe, well, then it will mean I’ve transcended the desert, and that will be enough of a celebration to make it worth it.
When you’re feeling like this, it’s hard to remember to be picky and wait for God’s best, with the full assurance that you’re worth the wait, that whoever God has lined up for you won’t see you or your children or your passion or your strength as baggage but as blessings. You won’t worry that you’re “too much to handle” because the right person won’t experience you as one who needs to be managed but as one to be enjoyed. I know this in my head, but emotions are little lying idiots sometimes. Today, I’m going to be honest and name my loneliness. It is what it is, and He’s not at all surprised by it. But in the midst of it, He’s present and involved and so gracious to send me friends who speak truth to me when I need it most.
As I raise my children, but especially my daughter, I think it’s going to be critically important for her to see what it looks like for her mom to not only reject and refuse to tolerate bad men, but to hold out and patiently wait for a good one. Table scraps aren’t good enough for queens, for daughters, or even for the birds. I’m done pretending like they’re good enough for me.