A Thousand Pieces

Lately I've been into The Fray. I know you're thinking to yourself, "Where have you been? They've been around since 2002." And no, I'm not into them for 'How to Save a Life.' The song that's been getting heavy rotation in my life's playlist is 'She Is.' The chore claims, "She is everything I want that I never knew I needed. She is everything I need that I never knew I wanted." On the surface it would appear that the girl in the song vastly exceeds his expectations. A year ago I would've agreed with that sentiment whole heartedly. To realize why I don't necessarily believe that is the singular explanation to the lyric now, or why it's hitting so close to home at this point in my life, we need to go back to a time I neither knew nor recognized what it was that I specifically needed or wanted.
When we start dating our desires are few and specific. We probably want someone cute and nice. As we mature, those wants become greater and we start to prioritize them. A lot like assembling a puzzle. Early on, it's a 12 piece puzzle of a dinosaur. Simple enough and when it's done you have a cartoon dinosaur and a mild sense of accomplishment. As you get older and your wants and needs grow and mature, your puzzle becomes exponentially more difficult. In any relationship, things become prioritized as well as compromised. Maybe this or that isn't as important as we first thought. Maybe we can live without this altogether. And then there's this attribute...we didn't even consider that. Or maybe we used to want that, but haven't had it in so long we'd forgotten we ever desired it? No matter how you look at it....it's complicated. Just like a big complicated puzzle! So you meet someone you like and the process begins. You have dumped the pieces out before you and slowing begin. You invest yourself. Time and patience. You learn things about each other. The pieces start to come together. As progress is made, you pick up the pace. A future becomes evident with each new day's investment. Before you know it, you're falling in love. Before you on the table lies a beautiful scene of Paris at night. In the center is the Eiffel Tower. But wait....there are six pieces missing. I mean it's not that big of a deal, right? You still have a beautiful picture of the Eiffel Tower. So what if there are a few pieces missing. But what of those missing pieces? What are you going to do about them? This is the decision that should give more people pause. How important are those six pieces? Is it as superficial as squeezing the tube of toothpaste from the middle? Or are you an introvert while she's an extrovert? Is it merely some random piece of the Paris skyline or is it a piece of the spotlight atop the tower? You have spent a lot of time and invested a lot of yourself in getting to this point. You do still have a beautiful picture of the Eiffel Tower. Maybe that should good enough. I'd be willing to bet that the 30+% of marriages that will fail this year believed that those six pieces were something they could live without. In looking back at both my failed marriages, I can say that I tried for years to look at the beauty of the Eiffel Tower...yet my eye were always drawn to those six random holes.
So life goes on. We put together puzzle after puzzle. We go slower now. Invest ourselves at a little more cautious pace. This ones missing a piece. This ones missing a dozen. With each puzzle we get both more determined to find one with every piece and more jaded that such a puzzle doesn't exist. And just at the moment your cynicism gets the best of you, and you say, "fuck it. I'm done!"......she appears. She seems nice, cute, fit, interesting...the picture has piqued your interest and desire. You decide that this puzzle is worth your undivided attention and commitment. Time flies by as you put the pieces together. The puzzle's scene is strangely familiar, which helps you fit it together with unfamiliar ease. With each piece you pick up you discover something. It might be simple and obvious like your shared love of the outdoors or something considerably less significant, like how we always unpack and do laundry before we relax after a trip. Pieces I never even considered or remembered to be important were flying into place at a fevered pace. Things I need, that I never knew I wanted.

Power vs Luck

It was several years ago now that my ex actually suggested that the bald eagles that I continuously saw at the beach must be my Power Animal. A Power Animal is a "Shamanic belief of a spirit that guides, helps, and protects an individual." She thought it must be the case, as while I saw the eagles on such a regular basis that my kids and I named the pair Sam, (after Sam the eagle from the Muppet Show) and Betsy (because it seemed like a great old school patriotic woman's name. That and none of us could properly pronounce or spell Sacagawea); and she never saw them on her visits to the beach.
I relished the notion that those majestic birds somehow protected me and gave me strength. Each day I saw them, I greeted them silently and drew the will to make it a great day.
Fast forward five years. I'm still at the beach and I'm still seeing the eagles on a fairly regular basis. Life is humming along for the most part. My career has maintained a plateau, the kids are, for the most, part happy and healthy. I have a pretty good life. I have been back in the seldom calm waters that is the dating scene again. Never getting it quite right....or at least not right enough by my standards. I still sought the eagles' guidance for a path to what was yet to come.
Not long ago, I found someone with whom everything seemed to click. There seemed very little downside to this becoming something great. We even saw the eagles together when walking on the beach together. That was it, I thought, the sign of my happily ever after.
Well, per usual, I couldn't have been more wrong. As soon as it arrived in my life....it was gone. Days passed as I searched for a logic as to what had happened? Nothing came to me. Damn eagles! Letting me get my hopes up like that. Eventually I forced myself to let it go. It was out of my hands from the start, and nothing I could do or say would ever have changed the outcome.

My epiphany unfolded like watching a storm rolling in. You know you're going to get wet, but you can't yet feel the rain. It started Sunday morning when my feet hit the floor. I felt strangely at peace. The hauntings of her were in the back of my memory (where they belonged) and my focus was now on what lay before me, rather than things that had happened in the past. Koval and Sydney were still asleep. It had been decided we would go gallivanting in Milwaukee later that morning, so I had told the kids I'd get up and walk Zooey, allowing them a lazy Sunday morning. I, too, had slept in. Catching up on some much needed sleep. I had skipped my usual stop for a mocha. Deciding instead, to hold out for Stone Creek Coffee when we got to the city. I parked and got out of the Jeep. The sun shone brightly for the first time in what seemed like weeks; casting a blinding brightness across the field as I made my way east towards the beach. I took a moment to bask in the sunlight, as to not take it's very presence for granted. I made the cut south at the water line and officially began my Saturday ritual. I scanned the tree line for the eagles. They were no where to be seen. "Fair weather friends," I scoffed to myself. Not that it mattered. I was content. It was already going to be a good day. Even without the eagles. That was the moment it hit me. They were my Power Animal. And today I didn't need the power. As the years slipped by, I had allowed my shallow needs to redefine what these magical birds meant to me. I wasn't drawing inner strength from seeing them; I was pigeon-holing them as my lucky charm. I was making them the talisman of my life rather that allowing them to by the catalyst to a future I could create by my own will. The day she and I saw them on the beach, they weren't there to wish me luck. They were there to give me the strength to handle the inevitable 'what comes next.'
That realization has trickled over into many aspects of my life since that morning. As superstitious as I am, I also realize that no one or nothing is going to shape my future in the way only I can. Even last night at the restaurant, I didn't lose a finger because I couldn't find the purple handled tongs I have used every day since I started there (I have heard that the tongs have been found, though. Whew). They were nothing more than a familial comfort to me.

I haven't seen the eagles since my epiphany. No matter. I know, when I need them, they'll be there. And when I see them, I will also know what they represent, and I will embrace their presence for what it's worth. They will be there to 'guide, help, and protect' this individual.