The "Blue Butterfly" Moment
When I was 15 I read a book by Nora Roberts called "Vision in White". The story was beautiful; a love story of course like they always tend to be with me, but this one was different. In the prologue of the book Roberts' character describes a moment in her life that changed the course of it forever. The moment the scrawny, red haired little girl from Connecticut realized exactly what her purpose in life was. Roberts went on to describe the moment in the clearest of detail; so clear and beautiful it was as if it was happening to you. The most important part of that moment for me was the blue butterfly. I know. What sense does that make? Bear with me. The little girl had always felt out of place in her life, unloved except by a precious few and completely muddled. Her father (her absentee clueless father) sent her an expensive camera for her birthday, the likes of which a little girl had no business getting for her birthday. She knew this of course but because it upset her maternal grandmother so she used it anyway. She found that every picture she ever took with the camera never came out right. A misplaced finger here, an out of focus shot there, nothing ever went quite right until that beautiful day in June that her friends decided to play 'Wedding Day'.
She was supposed to be the maid of honor that day and wear the scratchy pink dress she hated but she somehow convinced her loveable control freak of a friend that she could play the photographer instead. Her friend agreed and as the little girl prepared to take another picture that was out of focus and unappealing; the funniest thing happened. She lined up her shot just right and snapped the perfect moment in time when a vibrant blue butterfly landed on the bouquet and all of her friends faces transformed with wonder. The shot was incredible, lovely, and pure. From then on the blue butterfly symbolized the moment she realized her passion in life, the moment that she knew her purpose.
This concept was, from that moment on, placed in my memory as "The Blue Butterfly Moment". In life we all have that moment. We may not all call it precisely by that title but we all have that moment in our lives that defines us. That paves the way for who we are and shows us in the clearest of detail who we want to be and what we want to do with the rest of our lives. I wanted so badly to have that moment of clarity; to finally be able to say I had my epiphany.
It finally happened on a hot July evening in 2013 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I was visiting my uncle Ken with my paternal grandmother and sister for a few weeks that summer. Life had not been easy for the past few months. My maternal grandmother had become very ill and my mother thought it was in my sister's and my best interest to take a few weeks to relax and unwind before it got really bad. That evening was cooler than the day had been and it was a night that was so right and so good that we didn't want it to end. My uncle took us down to a beach that we didn't usually go to and while my sister and her wild ways took a swim in the ocean; I sat on the shore and watched the moonlight. The wind blew softly through my hair and the sea smell was strong around me as I breathed it in, I could practically taste it, I felt the magic in the world seeping into my skin. It was an amazing moment.
The moment that I saw my blue butterfly however was when I opened my eyes and that huge moon stared back at me. The light from it was so bright it lit the darkness of the evening and for a few seconds I felt like it was lighting the darkness of my life. I was so overcome by the simple stillness of the moment that I cried. I wiped my tears and I laughed. Any bystander at that moment would have thought I was crazy and perhaps I was; but it was so good. I knew in that moment everything I wanted out of life and that I couldn't let anything get in my way. The next few years were intense and they were so awful that it took everything I had in me not to give up on myself or the ones that I loved. I stand here today and I am finally starting to feel that magic again. I'm finally starting to realize that all my pain, all of my grandmother's suffering, all of my mother's tears, and all of my sister's meltdowns were for something. I can really truly begin to see the light from that moon again. I always wondered what it meant when people say it's always darkest before the dawn. Now I get it. I really do.
