Do You Need to Cry Out to God?
Another story thwarting the damnable lie of being unseen. You are seen. You are heard. You are known. And God is so creative in showing you.
It was so simple. The memories, the images of movement. Small olios of the early morning. We’d moved to Fort Worth just as I turned four. How do I know this? Because there was a long sidewalk that led up to the new front door. I stood at the end with a small box in my arms and chanted silently to myself, “I’m four years old. I’m four years old.” Somehow, some way, my little spirit must have known this moment must be sealed within my memory. This sidewalk. This change. This is permanent.
And here I am telling you about it. No doubt because I marked the occasion out loud.
I was a petite four who looked three, and somewhere near this new home and infamous sidewalk was a duck pond. I remember it being a very big duck pond, but now I think it could have just as easily been fancifully big to my littleness. And there was a very tall silver slide that burned hot in the Texas sun. I learned this the hard way.
But life was so very simple and virtuous in those moments at the duck pond. Mom brought bread. And she’d give me little pieces to throw to the ducks and I’d watch them eat. It was delightful.
I think about how hard it was for Mom moving into a new city for reasons I haven’t really yet written about. Most of which were of her own doing. But even so, I think back on how a simple trip with me to the duck pond during the mid-morning or midafternoon was while her older children were in school; a trip that was close by; a trip that cost only the amount of bread she’d brought; a quiet trip where she could hear her own thoughts, be in nature; watch me slide down a simmering hot slide.
Mom abhorred ignorance. She was well read. All those years in Sacred Heart schools (for all her complaints) demanded it. For this reason there were probably many things I learned earlier than perhaps other children had at that age – especially in that small town as you will read. Some of this was necessary, some of it probably could have waited.
As I tossed bread pieces to the ducks, I suddenly heard my mother sigh-groan a huff, perhaps she said “idiots”. I watched her gaze across the pond as two young men, (who knows how old they were. My young eyes thought they were “old”. They could have been teens. They could have been a father and son), were both filling beer cans with water. (How do I know they were beer cans? So many more questions I could ask about that specific memory.) But they were throwing the filled cans at the one duck who was “attacking” the other duck.
Thus my mother’s groan.
She then reveals to me in matter of fact, “the ducks are mating.”
It was her demeanor, her tone, her irritation that got the necessary message across. She didn’t need to explain in detail. Her subtext percolated. What those boys were doing was ridiculous and why did God put her in this hell hole? (God didn’t do it. She did it all by herself. God just said “Okay, if that’s what you really want....”)
Thinking more deeply on this as my adult vision peers again through my little girl eyes at the chaotic raptrap like violence of this young dad and boy (or was it two brothers?), I settle on a more appropriate response. Pity them.
Pity gets a bad rap, I think. We aren’t supposed to pity; for pity, gone unchecked, breeds arrogance and superiority. But when pity is placed properly in a nonjudgmental heart, a pure heart, it can be the springboard to mercy, can it not? I’ll allow this becomes an even deeper more challenging spiritual practice when the water-filled beer cans become deadlier weapons.
I must pity them for what they do not know. (On that train of thought how many poor suckers must pity me daily?) Even Jesus said we must forgive them for they know not what they do – vastly different circumstances, I know. But if He can do that from the cross, I surely must be able to pity the poor souls from across a pond. Someone didn’t teach them about the most fundamental truths of creation. Or maybe, (more likely?), they’d just never seen two ducks making more ducklings. Mating ducks, one must admit, look a bit violent. There is water involved after all. I’ll stop there.
Over the Memorial Day weekend, Philly and I took a long walk on the canal (the duck pond of Yardley). Usually we head through the little path that opens up onto the mini rapids where the neighborhood blue heron consistently can be found on a flat rock meditating (fishing). He’s always a lovely surprise. If we don’t see him there, then often we see him as we turn right and walk the path on the canal.
We never turn left. Until Memorial Day. You see the left turn is a little quieter, less trafficked, and feels a bit more wild and grown with leaves and lily pads. It sounds like an obvious choice but in turning right there is more spring, more flowers, more vibrant color.
But turning left, the less trafficked area, is a blessing because I can do nutty things like talk to God out loud and hear what I’m actually thinking. This is important. For too often we think our thoughts (some of them very important) without hearing them. Without catching them. So saying what we actually think about things aloud proves beneficial and illuminating. That’s the word. Illuminating… for we are bringing to light the thoughts that have been in the darkness of our subconscious.
I had a lot to say on this day. Much of it ranting. Getting my own annoyances off my mind. But some of it outright had to do with not feeling seen. I’ve talked about this before. So on this day I was just left of crying out to God, “Do you see me at all?” I didn’t say that exactly but that was the gist. Also I was saying things that my little self inwardly deems against the rules. I don’t mean debasing or corruptive speech or chewing out God (which he can take, by the way, even if he’d rather have a more loving convo with you). I mean asking for things outright that I think are probably less of a spiritual nature; if necessary for my spiritual well-being at all. Again, I’m a firm believer that God would rather you speak to him, even rant about the dying tomatoes in your back yard, than turn away completely until Perfect Little You returns. (Who wants that kind of God anyway?)
I’d gotten myself worked up into a tizzy.
Thanks be to God, the path was empty for many, many yards in both directions. Yes, yes, I cried all the tears. He knows I’m dramatic. (I’m an actress after all.) He gets me. Even if I didn’t feel seen in specific areas.
All this culminated in walking a mile or so, until Philly and I stopped and just stood there on the path and gazed across the canal. I sigh-groaned as Philly sat next to me watching the water as well - when it happened.
The blue heron swooped in over my right shoulder, not ten feet away, and landed directly in front of me just at the water’s edge, stood perfectly still, and stared at me. He stared at me for a very long moment.
Then he turned his gaze to the water as if to say Duc in Altum: Throw out into the deep. For a catch.
I knew it was Christ. I knew something magnificent, something heavenly had just happened for me. I thought of the symbols of Christ… wasn’t that a pelican? Does this count?
I stopped my brain. No. I had been asking for a Little Yellow Bird from Mom recently to no avail. I’d been disappointed.
God had something else, something more, something exquisite and entirely from Him, in mind.
These are the moments. (And this was a rare walk when I’d left my phone at home. So I paid very present attention.) What were the chances? The timing, the location. I’d turned left. Did the heron recognize us? Brain, stop!
Something heavenly – a messenger – had arrived.
You are seen. That is all. That is enough.
That is love.
A blue heron, after quick research is, unsurprisingly, a holy symbol for Christ.
God hears you. He sees you. He knows you. He’s sending you symbols, messages, and interior promptings in myriad ways. Are you watching? Are you listening? Are you hearing and catching his communique? Are you reaching out?
Thank God He’s patient and faithful and personal. (If I’d seen a turtle there’d be no story here.)
If today, you are feeling a bit discouraged because it’s been feeling a little too lonely, a little too quiet, a bit dry, now is the time to start talking. Out loud. Find that place (you know where it is) and have a “Come to Jesus” moment. Get personal. Ask the hard stuff. “Where are you?” Or in many cases, “Where were you?” You don’t have to ask for a sign. He’s so far ahead of you. And that’s a grace to hang your hat on.
Besides, that would ruin the surprise.
I can’t wait to hear what He did.
Seeing God and His creation , in the little things. In the seeming frustrations of life is real living. Nice crafting, like conversing with a friend while walking down a pond path. That’s real living.