Cutter's Word

This week, I discovered three baby birds just outside our office window in a nest of intricately woven twine, pine straw and leaves. I watched as the baby birds stretched their necks out of the nest, open mouths, waiting for their mother to return with a worm. It’s been one of the hottest summers with over 100-degree heat and little rain. Finally a passing storm came through, but only has made the humidity worse.

I found myself worrying about these little birds- will they survive? Maybe, we will only know as we see who will make it out of the nest and be able to hold their own out in the world. So often, we will never know what happens to them, only seeing their birth and their flight out of the nest. Several years ago, the strands of jasmine hanging over the outside storage area couldn't hold the nest complete with two blue eggs, and the mother left with no choice but to move on, abandoning the nest and unhatched eggs.

I am reminded about the time when my mother and I had hung our paintings and photographs side by side at a local art show in Tuscaloosa. The morning of the exhibit opening, one bird leaped out from the nest, high above the trees. As I rushed outside to see if he has survived, the daddy bird shooed me away. We watched as a second bird teetered on the end of a branch, and the mother literally scooted him off out into the world. We, then, had to leave for the exhibit, never seeing them afterwards. I was pushed out of the nest, as three weeks later I returned to the exhibit hall alone to reflect on the passage my mother had taken and the one she left for me to forge ahead, leaving traces for me to follow.

After my mother’s death and a previous loss of letting go of a relationship, I found myself hanging onto the tree branch, afraid of falling. It wasn’t until I surrendered myself to the changes in my life that I could begin to live fully and experience what it was to live, survive and thrive in the unknown and to come fully into my own being.

So often, we don’t know what will happen, and as we will experience the wholeness of our lives, complete with tragedies, crescendos, cliffhangers, complicated twists, happy endings and moral lessons, we don’t know what the final outcome will be. We are left teetering on the edge, pushed off into the world.

I am amazed at Barton’s ability to run and leap off of the mountainside, where I want to prepare every step along the way- is it right, is this the right direction, will this lead us where we want to go, what will others think, is this the right way? Leaping implies faith, but I was taught to distrust the world, and to distrust myself. Over the last year, I’ve been taking more creative leaps, more steps into the unknown or to places where others have told me not to go, and it’s been an incredible journey of challenges, successes, growth, learning and reflection.

Yesterday as I walked through the door, one baby bird leap out of the nest, his wings flailing through the grass on the ground, one step closer to full flight.

Where can you take a step out into the world, the place where you know you need to go, but can’t seem to get to? Dare to dream, and to take one step and even leap toward that path.