Once upon a time, a beautiful whiter than white butterfly was flittering along beside a great hot and rumbling mountain. He wondered why the air burned his sniffer a bit, but was so focused on finding another sweet flower to set his feet upon that he didn't realize the mountain was a volcano.
He had almost reached a safe distance when the volcano erupted. The huge noise, the sudden light and the heat hit him all at once. It shoved him 30,000 feet into the air, and had he not been a butterfly he'd have slammed back to the ground, but instead he floated, like a feather, like a dry leaf, tipping this way and that with the air currents taking him beyond the danger, slowly to the ground five miles away. Knocked out from the blast, he fell without notice or care.
He got so sick from the burn he nearly died. But all the other whiter than white butterflies gathered round and prayed for him with all their butterfly faith and eventually he did recover. He had changed though. Apparently the heat, the force and the flash of the explosion left a permanent photographic memory of the event on his wings so deep that it burrowed all the way into his DNA. Only the white rim of his wings remained untouched.
So he and all that followed him, each became unique perspectives on that one volcanic eruption. - every time you see one, you see yet another picture of that place, that moment in time.
A flittering little reminder to one and all that if you get too close to the heat, sometimes you get burned. And if it's a terrible heat, like alcoholism, or any drug addiction, like marrying a molester or someone abusive, sometimes it burns all the way into your DNA so that it marks your children and theirs too. Certainly prayer can help you survive.
But the sins of the father and the mistakes of the mother are visited upon their children to the third and fourth generation isn't just a biblical concept, it's scientifically proven as well. The children of addicts are genetically predisposed to become addicts. The children of abused parents are socially predisposed to allow it too.
"If you get too close to the heat sometimes, more than just you gets burned."
The End
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You only see this because 'HE' (not the picture) is too beautiful to throw away. I took three pictures of him and foolishly quit there. This was the best one and I had to crop the hell out of it. I never see it without a little ache of regret. Such a beauty and I didn't do him justice. This Eastern Comma caused me to make the rule: Don't ever stop shooting till the butterfly has left the area.
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Set your camera to macro mode
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no sudden movements
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no sudden sounds
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softly sweet talk or sing to him
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and if he lets you take a picture
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get a little closer
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and with each picture get a little closer still
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You don't quit shooting till he leaves
These digitals make it easy to get good butterfly shots so long as you don't quit before they leave.
[photo and butterfly inspired fable © lollie dot com]
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