“Nature is much more disorder than order.” 

Richard Rohr, Falling Upward

Twenty years ago, I went through something really painful.  It was dark and depressing and it took me quite a while to realize it had been like falling into a six-foot hole.  Just a hole only slightly wider than my body so right in front of my face was a wall of dark dirt – but I was too depressed to realize that’s where I was, that if I just looked up there was sun and life.

As I started to come out of the really painful time, maybe even as I grew into something more than I had been before the painful thing, a friend gave me a little figurine.  She said it reminded her of me when she first saw it, because that was how I seemed to be as I recovered. 

On the bottom of the figure is the word HAPPINESS. 

Arms outstretched.  Head tilted slightly back and face looking up.  There are no eyes but you get a sense that that is where she would be looking.

There are also three little bluebirds perched on her arms.  Bluebirds signify happiness, in case you didn’t know.  Her face turned up, three little birds with wings outstretched resting on her outstretched arms. 

Happiness.

Until the birds’ wings, one by one, started breaking off. 

I keep my house fairly tidy, but I am not big on dusting.  I have to force myself to do it – every once in a while.  Just so you understand here, that when I say the wings broke when I dusted that figure, you realize it’s not like it was a weekly occurrence and I was overdoing it.  Also, sometimes as I moved it, it fell over and a wing broke – apparently birds on your arms can make you top heavy.

The first time one of the wings broke off I was crushed! 

“No!  It’s not supposed to be broken.  She’s supposed to be whole!”

Slowly, one wing after another has broken off over the years (ok, I DO dust more than once a year…anyway…).

Of the three bluebirds of happiness with six wings originally outstretched, they are down to two wings TOTAL, each missing at least one.  One bird is wingless – flightless.

And slowly I have come to love the brokenness about the figurine.

Because it seems more honest.

Because I have learned that happiness, beauty in the brokenness can coexist with the pain in the brokenness.

Because life in the last twenty years has broken me in other ways.

Again and again. 

I kept each wing as it broke planning to glue them back on.  But really, how can you glue something so tiny back together and expect it to look good and to last?

So, the figurine has arms outstretched with bluebirds that would have to learn to fly with broken wings. 

And yet her arms are still outstretched and she is still looking up. 

As if she is trying to believe that she can learn to fly with broken wings too.

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.” 

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross