Bird’s Eye View
It was approximately three months ago, the moonlight shining brightly down through my bedroom blinds and I find myself tossing from one side to the other. There was an internal force, an invisible hand, so strong that it led me to wake up physically, later I realized my awakening was much more mental than anything else.
That night I sat up from my bed, feeling a flood of emotions and ideas race across my mind. The ideas were unfinished tasks I had yet to begin. On one hand, it was the to do list before the first days of school for your child. If you are a parent, you can relate. On the other hand, it was a strange feeling of unmasking from an unwanted blindfold. The lifelong journey of walking uphill blindfolded. This night an invisible hand removed the blindfold, and I see a bird’s eye view of my life thus far.
Before the night of my awakening, I always had the need to be careful. I tend to blame my upbringing for some of it growing up too quickly. Mother hated to be called mother, she approved of mom or mama and took offense if we called her mother, but for the purposes of this story, it will do. She had been modeling many of the fashions she created. I was naturally next in line when she entered me into children’s pageants as young as an infant. When I won, she naturally placed this path in front of me. Body image was always important, to remain thin, people pleasing, staying silent, and always wearing clothes I didn’t and wouldn’t choose. Left feeling unsatisfied, this eventually led to my superficial awareness of self.
As a preteen, I eventually explained my displeasure leading to my exiting of being a part of the pageants for good. The mental aspect didn’t exit as easily. What was left was a constant need for perfection, compulsive habits around control, and a strange complex and a feeling of being watched. Looking back, it’s a disservice to the lives of young children who aren’t mentally developed.
Lately, everything has felt more aligned, not perfect but aligned. I struggled through the first part of life trying to make sense of the senseless. Now, I’m living life with the realization that life doesn’t have to make sense, and in life, it rarely does. So, I began to write to share with others, not just writing for myself any longer. Mother would tell the whole family that as a toddler, I made up stories about bears, cats, dogs, anything that tied animals into my story. Looking back, the love of animals came from my grandmother. I recall her singing to her dogs and cats while dancing with them, silly, but it was her way of showing us their importance.
I’ve been writing for as long as I can remember. So, when my awakening was initiated, the force pushed me to do what I always knew that I should be doing, which was telling stories. Now that I’m aware of this force, I can plainly see from the bird’s eye view that storytelling is as much for the writer as it is for the reader and meant to be shared.
Thank you for reading Bird’s Eye View.
