A woman brought a stick bug to my sons class for them to take care of while her family went on vacation. Her daughter is one of my son’s classmates. The stick bug lives in a plastic container made for the occasion. It has a flip top and breathing holes galore. The teacher said they would have to add some plastic wrap to contain the tiny babies that would inevitably come soon and often.
I was drawn into the conversation as the teacher related some stick bug facts. I learned they are all female and reproduce thousands of offspring at a time. Without plastic wrap they will escape through the containers breathing holes and cover the classroom. This surprised me because I have only seen stick bugs two or three times in my life. I had always assumed they were rare. I knew they were brilliant at remaining hidden, I just didn’t know they were genius.
The last fact she told us was stick bugs grow wings and fly just before they die. I almost burst into tears when she said it. I had just finished The Pull of the Moon by Elizabeth Berg, a book that spoke to me so clearly, it was shouting in the softest voice possible. It is a story of a menopausal woman who gets in her car, leaves her husband, whom she loves, and starts driving, starts growing her wings. In the course of her journey she finds herself, the self that had been crowded out by husband and child and ones rightful place in society. I love that she never blames her family or intends to leave them permanently.
I’m tired of assigning blame. I crave to know things just are what they are and they can and most likely will change. I am still torn between the rage and fear of not growing wings until just before I die and the gratitude I grew them at all.
A year ago July a gorgeous friend died. She was a dynamic force of nature. She was intimate with depth. Her beginnings were difficult and painful, yet she raised two amazing individuals, stayed married to the same man her whole adult life , ran many successful businesses, and was loved and adored by many. I met her just when she began to grow her wings. Seven years later she was dead. When my son’s teacher told me the story of the stick bug, I began to think about all the women I knew like my friend, there are so many of us. There is a passage in Berg’s book that I can’t get out of my mind. “I still feel a kind of fear. An awful shame. I went to a lecture once by a famous psychiatrist who was talking about how women must rid themselves of the idea that they are sitting on the ground, eyes cast downward, waiting for a man to tap them on the shoulder.” I began my awakening to this position during my divorce and birth of my child. It was one of the most painful awakenings I’ve ever had. I had spent my life inwardly waiting for a man, any man, to define me, to draw my outline clearly so I could finally stop loosing sight of myself.
My friends growth was all about discovering what made her happy. It seems so simple and obvious, especially to the daughters of the women who fought so hard to stand up and move on. In the book the character realizes how she is always asking her husband what he thinks and if they should do this or that and he states what he is going to do and does it. She sends him letters on her trip and in one she describes the house they are going to build, according to her design, when she gets back. “You can do something in our new house just for you too, but this time you will ask me about it. It will be your turn to say, ‘What do you think about this idea Nan?’ And it will be my turn to say, ‘Well…I suppose’.” I felt a shock run through me when I read this. I almost couldn’t imagine it being that way for something as big as building a house. Yet I deferred in the small things too and not just to men, but life in general.
I have listened to and born witness to countless women growing their wings before they die. What I see in myself and so many others is a paralyzing fear to declare ourselves to ourselves. To grow my wings I must stop waiting. My friend knew this and slowly but surely she began to declare herself to everyone and especially to herself. She didn’t wait for death to set her free, she finally found what made her happy, death was just the best way she knew how to bring it to fruition. I can only hope to be as brave.
