Sunday, September 1, 2013

Four Leaf Clovers

As a kid, I remember spending what felt like hours searching for the elusive four leaf clover.  On more than one occasion, I got lucky, and found one!  It was always exhilarating, after crawling around in the grass long enough to have green-stained knees, coming up with one of those little gems like you were the champion of the world.

Four leaf clovers.

Technically, a mutation of the normal, more typical, three leaf clover.  The regular one.  The way most clovers are made.

We scour the ground in search of the odd one out.  The unique.  The different.  The lucky.  Finding a three leaf clover is ordinary.  Everyone is a three leaf clover.  The four leaf clover.  That's different.  That's lucky.

Even though, technically, it's mutated.  It's deformed.  It's grossly different than the rest.

I've been thinking about this for a while.  How it connects to my body.  To my eating disorder.  To recovery.

I want that four leaf clover.  It's different.

Yet.

I hate this body in which I reside for that same reason.

Cause it's different.

I want to be normal.  I want to be like that three leaf clover.  Fitting in with everyone else.  One of the crowd.

Or do I?

If everyone is in search of that one, so-called lucky, four leaf clover...... maybe it's time to start rethinking this.  Maybe being different is like being that four leaf clover...... maybe it means some one will actually pick me, and find me to be their lucky charm.....

Maybe I need to pick me first......

8 comments:

  1. "Maybe I need to pick me first."

    Brilliant, and poetic, and perfect.

    Thank you for sharing your heart.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well, I'll just soak up your words Amanda, cause I sure don't believe them. As hard as words might be to share, sometimes it's the only way to listen to ourselves.

      Delete
  2. This is an interesting perspective... it's funny how in our eating disorders, there is a constant push-pull between wanting to be "normal" and yet fiercely guarding this disease that makes us "unique". And yet, we are both, with or without the illness. We are precious individuals bound with common humanity. We really do have both :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "push-pull between wanting to be "normal" and yet fiercely guarding this disease that makes us "unique"."

      I'd give my teeth, my left arm, and my right eye to get rid of this eating disorder and accept that I am normal and unique without it....

      Delete
  3. What a useful and lovely way of thinking about things.

    ReplyDelete

So? What do you think?