Uplift

I walked out of the elevator of the Woodruff House, our spring break hotel in Nauvoo, and came face to face with the prettiest painting I'd ever seen of bees. I've mentioned a thousand times Melissa is Greek for honey bee, hence why I love bees. Narcissistic? Maybe. I told Greg I loved the painting and he said he loved it, too. It reminded me of us. It was not for sale.

A month later a nice man from UPS delivered it to my porch. I had zero clue it was in the works, Greg completely surprised me. Greg is getting really good at speaking my love language, my language being sentiment sprinkled with effort. He just kept calling and asking the hotel if they'd sell it, ignoring "no" and "it belongs in the hotel owner's private collection". They caved the week before my birthday. Big points for Greg.

Before I can gush about the painting I have to state I have never cared for group projects. I've despised them since elementary school. The agony of being in a group with one kid who does nothing and another kid with messy handwriting. Or that kid who laughs about everything instead of cracking down to work. Time wasters, that's what group projects are. It's so hard to be in a group when you're an alpha.

Part of my problem is I want to do it alone. I like working with Myself. We get along.

RE's sixth-grade teacher told me an interesting story about her fellowship in China a few years back. In meeting with an American CEO running a Chinese company he mentioned the Chinese were academic and performance superstars, however, most of them couldn't work together. They were Supermen, not Super Bowl winners. There was no teamwork. Of course, this is a mass generalization and I'm not saying all Chinese people stink at group projects. I'm only saying I stink at group projects and I'm an American.

It's twenty times easier to do it yourself than to delegate. You don't have to trust anybody or wait for things to fall through. Why step on toes, stretch others to a new level of discomfort, and give up total control when you can pull an all nighter on your own and get all the glory? Yes, I know who I sound like.

So Greg and RE were gone for two whole days, two days I publicly announced as Hermit Heaven. In the midst of solitary confinement my brain had time to play pinball. I started at the top of my reading pile, my thoughts bounced here, there, aimlessly meandered downward and suddenly ricocheted here-there-here-there, quickly landing in the jackpot divot where I earned a million points. I wanted to blog my bee painting and use a quote I'd heard about ascending together for the photo. I searched the line I knew and the top Google result was an article by Elder Robert D. Hales from 1977 entitled "We Can't Do It Alone." Ironic? It gets worse. He quotes, "A hermit is one who suffers from the extreme of selfishness."

Not quite a shot through the heart as these two days were the exception to my rule; I'm usually out and about doing good in the world. But the warning was noted. The article was beautiful; so many good stories, especially the one about how Thomas Moore came to write "Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms" and about the dead baby robins in Long Island. Last night, mere hours before I happened upon the article, I mowed the front yard and found a broken robin egg washed out of the gutter. These things always happen to me. I call them "life clusters". It's like when I read The Winter Sea, got an anthropologie catalog featuring models in tartan skirts doing a shoot on what was clearly the Scottish coast, and borrowed U2: Live at Slane Castle all in the same week. Life cluster. 

Google got me thinking about Gaggle which made me retrieve a well-loved article in our home entitled "The Sense of a Goose". I quote:

By flying in "V" formation the whole flock adds at least 71 percent greater flying range than if each bird flew on its own. As each bird flaps its wings it creates an uplift for the bird immediately following.

People who share a common direction and sense of community can get where they are going more quickly and easily because they are traveling on the thrust of one another. 

The last few pre-Archer years of my life were literally a drag. Thankfully I was part of several "V" formations that proved how powerfully people can combine for good. Flying in a flock is essentially a group project. Marriage, motherhood, being part of a family: assigned group projects. Friendship, church service, neighborliness: volunteer group projects. I'm having a hard time finding any part of my life that is truly my own. So much for being a hermit. So much for hating group projects.

Now I can gush about the painting. It's huge (30"x30"). It's perfect. It's making me want to repaint my walls and add more blue to our hive. I've stared at it for hours. Archer totally knows the word "bumblebee" and every time I carry him past the painting he does his little bee sign with tiny fingers. I love the neon green stripe on the lower bee's body and the rough cloud texture. Mostly I love what it represents: Two bumblebees working side by side (yep, group project) for a cause called COLONY (there is no I in COLONY). Two bees happily laboring under the Son, lifting each other along the way, scattering pollen for the greater good.

The painting is not named or signed and no one, including the gallery, knows who painted the bees. I could have in my possession the Venus de Milo of canvases. If it were up to Greg he would probably name the painting Maverick and Goose, me being "Goose" because Greg always wanted to be called "Mav". Slider, you stink.

Random bee trivia from tag of a bee plaque Greg bought me: Bees have been known since ancient time for making delicious honey from the nectar of flowers. There are over 20,000 species of bees and they are found all over the world except for Antarctica. Most bees fly in excess of 12 mph. Bees have superb vision, having three single eyes and two compound eyes. Bees were the symbol Napoleon chose to adorn his coronation robes as well as his Empire style furniture, fabric, and carpet.