Dog and Butterfly
_____________________________________________________________________
So there I was at the Outlaw Preacher’s (Re)Union 2011 in Nashville, Tennessee just minding my own business when this beautiful woman approached me and reached out to me with a hug. Of course being the kind of guy that likes hugs from beautiful women, I returned the gesture. I recognized her immediately as Joy Wilson, the pretty prayer lady. Or at least that is what I knew of her. I had no other recollections of Joy other than her postings on Facebook, her blog and her terrific little book Uncensored Prayer.
Well there was one thing. She did send me a little Facebook message telling me to come to this thing and “be blessed.” She did have somewhere in her mind, this little window into my soul that not even I could view. She knew I needed this get-together, I really didn’t think so. In fact I was tired, beat up, burnt out and disgruntled and ready for a fight, but a blessing sounded good.
It was in our first conversation that we discovered that we are both writers, and that I read her blog. It was also in this first conversation that she said, “well, you will have to guest blog on my site then.” I was honored to be asked to contribute to anything she was doing, and so I just said “Yes.” Yes, I would. I asked her if there was anything in particular she would have me write about and she then lowered the boom on me.
She said, “you know what I want you to write about?”
“Uhm, no not exactly.”
“I want you to write about your heartsong.”
I don’t know if I was visibly confused or not, but she then responded with,
“Do you know what that is?”
In my head I was thinking is she asking me if I know what my heartsong is, or is she asking me if I know what a heart-song is?
I said “Yes.” Even though to be honest I really didn’t have the answer for either of those questions.
“Well it is the thing you care about the most, something that makes your heart sing, something like that.”
I smiled and nodded affirmatively and started thinking.
So let’s go back a bit. As a child I remember a song that particularly appealed to me. I was maybe 12 when I first heard this particular “Heart” song.
There I was with the old man
Stranded again so off I’d ran
A young world crashing around me
No possibilities of getting what I need
He looked at me and smiled
Said “No, no, no, no, no child.
See the dog and butterfly. Up in the
Air he like to fly.” Dog and butterfly
Below she had to try. She roll back down
To the warm soft ground laughing
She don’t know why, she don’t know why
Dog and butterfly
I didn't completely understand the song back then, but I loved it upon first hearing it. Later in life, as I grew to understand the song better, I placed myself in the role of the dog, chasing a butterfly over a grassy land mass, leaping in the air and falling, the territory under my feet changing as I run and not really noticing it, my dreams, my loves, my life always seemingly out of grasp My response after failing was usually something more than a chuckle or two.
It usually meant a lot of self-reflection and down time for me — a time of crying until I had no tears left to shed; a time where bad stuff happened in my heart, a time where I judged myself as not-enough, worthless, stupid -- ugly.It seemed as if by the time I reached my later teen years that I would never have anything that I wanted and I began to get settled into the idea that I should just be happy with what I had and leave the damn butterflies alone. I would never get the things I wanted and I just needed to get used to that idea. That butterfly was just a tease — never attainable, always dancing above my head and just out of my grasp.
Well I stumbled upon your secret place
Safe in the trees you had tears on your face
Wrestling with your desires frozen strangers
Stealing your fires. The message hit my mind
Only words that I could find
See the dog and butterfly
Up in the air he like to fly
Dog and butterfly below she had to try
She roll back down to the warm soft ground
Laughing to the sky, up to the sky
Dog and butterfly
It was eternity set in my heart, and eternity never happens to losers like me. So by the age of 16, I had come to the conclusion that I was not going to live beyond the age of 18. I had become an overly aggressive, angry youth that realized that getting beat-up, getting made fun of and being harassed by bigger kids were the only things within his grasp.
I had multiple people in my life that just seemed to hate me on site. Some were pretty mean and dangerous, and I had plans to actually kill one of them literally out of self defense. He was killing me slowly every time he body slammed my small frame against the hard concrete walls at school or knocked my books out of my hands, then pushed me to the ground when I turned towards them, or called me ugly or gay or gross. It was to be either him or me, and I did not want to die anymore.
Then something happened
A pretty blond girl asked me to go with her to church. She saw me. I had been invisible and I liked it that way, but I never imagined that she would chat me up. I was definitely not the kind of person I had imagined her talking to. But, she did ask me.
She was a butterfly. I knew she was, but for some reason I thought maybe this time I could catch her — maybe if I lept extra hard? Who was I kidding? At 16, I was already too tired to go chasing after another dream, sign of life, girl. But as fate would have it, eternity was calling after me again, and this time, like so many times before, I was a fool. I actually listened.
Years later finds me celebrating my 18th birthday and wondering how it happened. Jesus was now in my heart and he had pulled me through past my 18th birthday. I never killed that kid and as it turns out we somehow made amends. I was happier and hopeful for the future. The blond girl as it turned out
was in fact a butterfly. She was just a tease for Jesus. I never got to catch her.
So if Sherry was the butterfly that took me to Jesus, then Anita was the one who made me stay. She was another pretty butterfly (brunette) dancing in the sky, pulling me deeper and deeper into the world of Christianity and church and youth group and everything else, never promising me anything. I chased that butterfly for far too long only to continue falling down on my ass hard.
Fast-forward a bit, I am 19 years old, and I work with this guy named Tony. I don’t like him very much because he is a bit of a show-off, but he is asking me to go home with him for some pizza and beer. No one ever really chooses to hang out with me in an informal setting so I decided to see where this was going to go. I had no real friends. Even Jesus could not manage to firm up any real friendships for me. So I chased after yet another elusive winged creature – friendship.
But this butterfly, led me again to different territory. It was there in Tony’s apartment that I would meet my true heart-song. She wasn’t supposed to be there. She was his neighbor and had come into the apartment due to an impromptu invitation from Tony. She was with her sister and I could not take my eyes off of her. Yet, I was very good about not letting her know I was looking. I did not say a word to her that night except maybe hello. Why should I? She was too beautiful. She was just another one of those elusive colorful things that was there to make me give chase only to never actually grasp anything good. I was sore from falling down.
It took Tony two solid weeks to convince me that she wanted me to call her and ask her out. Tammy would eventually be my wife. As it turned out she was not a butterfly, she was the new territory that I encountered while chasing after eternity. She is still with me after 25 years of marriage and my heart still sings every time I look at her and see her smile.
Looking back now I think that maybe the butterfly is this part of god that pulls us along, even when we think we are dead and can’t possibly move. It dances in our peripheral saying “catch me if you can” all the while moving us closer and closer to the good, the perfect, the beautiful – god's eternity set upon our heart — telling us again and again that we are good, that we are worth it, that god considers us key players and that god cares about us immensely and never gives up on us, even when we have given up on ourselves - even when it seems like things will never change -- there flies the butterfly close enough to tease, but just out of reach.
“We’re getting older the world’s getting colder
for the life of me I don’t know the reason why
Maybe it’s livin’ making us give in
Hearts rolling in taken back on the tide
We’re balanced together ocean upon the sky”
Joy Wilson’s word, was a butterfly fluttering around above me telling me “come along.” “Come and be blessed.” Silly ole’ me lept in the air as much as one my age can leap after this thing called blessing. I drove my car and spent some money and lept after the Outlaw Preacher’s (Re)Union 2011. And silly ole’ me fell to the ground in pursuit of blessing, but this time laughing and realizing for sure that the terrain has changed once again – this is a different place that God has led me. This is good.
Sometimes when you are pursuing a butterfly and it just seems like you ought to have this one, stop, look around you, see where you have gone and realize that maybe, just maybe you were never supposed to have it. Maybe what you are supposed to have is right in front of your face, and you can’t see it because you have been leaping after the unattainable for so long. Two days into the reunion, I might have sung this:
Another night in this strange town
Moonlight holding me light as down
Voice of confusion inside of me
Just begging to go back where I’m free
Feels like I’m through
Then the old man’s words are true
See the dog and butterfly
Up in the air he like to fly
Dog and butterfly, below she had to try
She roll back down to the warm soft
Ground with a little tear in her eye
She had to try, she had to try
