Ever since I learned that my family has deep Bi-polar schizophrenic tenancies, and roots that go way back through our family tree, I've been a little, (okay a lot more) skeptical about any thing that sounds a little bizarre, or not explainable, or hyper spiritual, or anything too fantastic. My family genome is especially good at spotting patterns. You could say it's in our blood. And when I say bipolar-schizophrenic tenancies, I mean it. I don't throw those words around lightly, like I've seen people use them around the internet, riding some popular mental illness wave, as an excuse for their moods.
For me and my family, this stuff is real---in technicolor and shadow real.
And because I know how real it is, I view the world a little more softly, and people in it with more compassionate eyes, because who knows, we all could be a bit crazy. And the crazy, weird, mean, odd, the things we do may be just a byproduct of our messed up malnourished bodies and minds.
So anything that seems----odd, well I make sure to inspect such happenings with logical eyes. I have to. I guess that would make me into somewhat of a realist.
Yeah, I know. But you're thinking, whoa, sister, you're an author. Someone who makes up fantastic stories for a living---so why are you dissing on the fantastical side of life?
True, I am an author of fiction.
But truth is stranger than fiction.
It is.
And I'm not dissing on the impossible. I just do a double take of it, just to be sure. Though, one can never be really, really sure about too much of anything, because the more I know, the less I seem to know about anything.
Yet despite this, despite my aversion to the mystical land of superstitions, and the realm of the unexplained, I openly admit, that I who am Miss research it out first, acquired a superstition or something, I'm not sure if I'd even call it that, but ever since I had my accident with my elbow, I've been witness to synchronicity. According to wickipedia, synchronicity basically means, "meaningful coincidences" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchronicity
That's what's been happening to me.
I'm not even sure if that's what I've been witness to. Or if I'm just going off the deep end. Or if I've just been looking for meaning in everything, and I'm finding it because I want to find meaning because I need to find meaning---just like the time I became the owner of a white car, I saw white cars everywhere, because I was more conscious of white cars.
Who knows?
So what are these synchronicitys-ies that have been happening to me, or however you say it? I'm rather embarrassed to even voice them. Because...well it seems really silly. They are. Truly. Very silly. But because they are so silly. I have to write them down, and let you judge how silly they are for yourself.
I'll write my weird down, so you can laugh at me. And I give you permission to do so. Go ahead, laugh loud. I'm laughing at myself.
Okay,
So when I injured my arm, I'm not sure if I told you that the real reason why I was even dashing across the log, that flipped me onto the ground, was because I first spied a large flock of crows (a Murder of Crows is what their technically called) circling in the sky, over our chicken coop. I had my face turned to the sky, while I was frolicking across the log, watching those crows when the log rolled and fell forward, and dislocated my elbow, and nothing has been the same as it was. I'm not the same person. Well, I am, but I'm not. And my arm looks like it's been screwed on backwards, especially when I try and straighten. For some reason an unbendable ugly Barbie doll arm that's been popped off, and put back on comes to mind.
I got my cast off the 16th, and from then on the sixes just kept following me everywhere. Seriously. I wish I would have written all of the weird---yes weird six associations that kept following me around since that day. It was uncanny. The reason why I mention this, is that for some reason 6 has always been my number---probably because of my peculiar birth date. Because of that, I always pay attention when 6 shows up multiple times.
The other weird thing that kept--and keeps showing up are Crows. Yes, and don't go thinking that I've gone all weird on you.
This is the truth.
Yes crows.
After I the accident, I was sitting on outside with nothing much to do, because my arm was in a cast, and I felt like I was getting a fever, so I just was swinging on the lawn swing feeling sorry for myself.
Then a crow shows up, and swoops over the trees and starts cawing at me, flying back and forth.
Weird.
But not too weird. Not until they kept on appearing.
They seemed and seem to be following me around, just like the number six.
It was starting to creep me out. Another instance, I was in my bedroom, and a crow swooped into the tree above my window, and started making a creepy caw, caw caw, just as I was doing a google search on the meaning of crows. It disturbed me so much I ran outside, and shouted at it to leave.
The bird sounded angry, and refused to leave for quite a while.
More similar things seem to happen. More crows. More sixes.
Another instance, I was outside in the snow, in the back of the pickup truck, and along swoops two huge crows. They were beautiful. They swooshed above me in the trees, their big wings more defined by the white hoar frost lacing the branches. And they perched in the trees, and cawed, and then circled round and cawed some more, and then finally flew off.
That memory is very vivid, because their black wings against the white frost was very beautiful. I'm not sure what any of it means, or if it means anything.
Some people associate crows and sixes with not so good things.
I was not going to be so naive and cave into the silly superstitious fear of such things. I only know that both the crows and six keeps showing up. I'm probably just paranoid, because of the accident.
After all these weird Synchronicity kept showing up repeatedly, I decided to do my own research, so as not to freak myself out. And because I am somewhat a nerd, "though I never really considered myself one" I did my homework, and looked up crow meanings, and number six meanings, and got a whole boatload of information. (Just because I was curious) What I found out made me feel more at ease, and less paranoid.
Crows are supposedly a good omen. So I thought that was good, even if I didn't believe in such things. So says the great oracle--google. I also learned crows are associated with the 6th sense, with being jokesters and pulling out the rug beneath your feet, they are a symbol of change, of rebirth, of healing, of becoming your authentic self, and, also, crow it is the left-handed guardian. (Which I have to laugh at) because it was my left arm that was the one that was so badly injured. They are also associated with the sixth sense. Which I also thought was kinda strange. These are just some of the tidbits worth mentioning that I gleaned from these websites,
I've included links to below give credit to the authors, for my various research just so I could find some meaning, that didn't freak me out. And most of what I learned was good.
http://www.birdclan.org/crow.html
http://www.beliefnet.com/Wellness/Environment/Galleries/A-Spiritual-Field-Guide-to-Birds.aspx?p=3
http://www.universeofsymbolism.com/symbolic-crow-meaning.html
http://www.shamanicjourney.com/crow-power-animal-symbol-of-sacred-law-change
http://www.whats-your-sign.com/crow-symbolism.html
The meaning of the number six was really interesting as well, there a lot of interesting associations with it. Some good, some weird. But I liked the good stuff, so I'm keeping the good in my brain files. The message, if there was in such a number, is pretty much don't worry too much about finances, and to pray for help. And you're on the right track. http://www.angeltherapy.com/blog/meaning-number-6
So yeah, I like to be on the right track, so anyway. I'm not sure what the whole point to this post is. It's certainly not to give fuel to the fire of omens, and superstitions. Too many people out there trust too much in things like that. I told my sister a little bit about the weirdness, and she was like, "Oh....I have a shirt for you." I guess she owned this shirt for some girl scamp thing, and she bequeathed it on me, (the blow picture is the shirt)
Me I was just baffled, because it kept happening to me a lot, I and wanted to find meaning in something that seemed so bizarre, and unexplainable---Meaning to my own hurt.
And I did. Through the pain, and frustration of that trial I found out something about myself. I learned that healing has to come in its own time.
You have to trust God to put all the pieces back together when you can't bend your own arm to pick them back up.
I learned patience, trust, and a quiet reliance that God knows what he's doing, even if I didn't at the time. I learned deep surrender to what I cannot control or change.
Surrender.
It is one of the hardest lessons of life. To put yourself on the alter, and say, okay, make me into what you want.
I never said this before, because it makes me feel embarrassed, but the initial financial cost of my injured arm medical expense was miraculously covered by a hospital grant. I applied for the grant, but never thought anything would amount of it. I didn't think I would get the help I needed.
But this time, when I really needed it.
I did.
That was a miracle in itself.
That was a huge burden that weighed heavily on me, even more than not being able to bend my arm. The weight of it not knowing how I was going to pay it off made me hate myself in so many ways.
If only I had a regular job, if only I...and on and on...
Just recently, I have been starting to do things I haven't been to for months, I began playing my flute again. I picked up one of my hula hoops, and am starting to retrain my arm to do the things I could do before with a lot more ease.
This is me in and my arm in December, "Christmas Eve actually."
I'm trying to build back muscle where it was lost.
And that's all we can do sometimes, build where we have lost, again, and again. Our progress might be slow, painful, frustrating. We my want to give up. The things we used to do before with ease, are heavy and painful.
But through God's grace, we will be stronger than we were before. Better because we fell forward. And because you fell hard, it dislocated a few things, it wasn't fun, it hurt, but sometimes our lives have to be dislocated, and disjointed, in order for God to rearrange us into better people, to reshape our souls, and keep our eyes fixed on him.
C S Lewis said it better.
"Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world."
There's no
Crow about it.
Whatever keeps on swooping into your life, cawing at you
from the sky, whatever synchronicitys-ies that grab your attention. Whatever
pain you're going through right now. Maybe God's just trying to get your
attention.
