We are in a season of metamorphosis.
Every year for Easter, my family hosts a gathering of friends and family. I spend the weeks prior to the holiday filling over 1000 plastic Easter eggs with an array of candies and chocolates. My wife and I prepare some finger foods and usually find a new distinct cocktail to share, and begin to anticipate (usually with increasing tension and a few fights) this time of coming together as a community. On the day of the event we “hide” those eggs around our property, along with a few special “Golden Eggs” for a lucky few to find. This is a great time of coming together. However, the apex of the event is that toward the end, we gather together and I hand out to each child a live butterfly, individually wrapped in a triangular box. And all together we release these butterfly’s to the world.
You may ask, why a butterfly. For me, the butterfly is a wonderful representation of what this season and holiday holds for us a human population. Spring is a time where we all pause in wonderment of the new growth, the flowering beauty and the increasing warming days. We embody a sense of hope, one that this will continue to warmer days, and with them the freedom to move wander further away form the comfort of home, heat and work. The hope that comes with anticipation of summer, vacation, swimming, “getting out”. For those who come from the Christian Faith, this is a time of celebrating the Resurrection. That reminder that we are not stuck in the shame and grief of our poor decisions, behaviors and actions. But that we too can be forgiven and transformed. This is a season we can all share the feeling of anticipated hope, no matter how we believe or understand the world around us. And, for me the butterfly represents this anticipated hope well.
As I contemplate this Easter season, the themes of metamorphosis and anticipated hope takes on an even more profound meaning. We will not gather this year. I am not frantically filling eggs, or coming up with a new cocktail. However, I did order the butterfly’s, and will find a way to get them to those family’s who would normally be gathered. According to the dictionary, Metamorphosis is the process of transformation from immature form to an adult form. Underneath this definition lists some synonyms, and one of them is Transfiguration, which is defined as complete change of form or appearance into a more beautiful or spiritual state. This sure seems very relevant to opportunity of this time we are all sharing as we slow down, find ourselves disconnected from the frenzy of the outside world, and somewhat encased (trapped) with those around us.
Those of us who have spent time on streams or rivers with a fly rod in our hands are very aware of the moment insects are released from there time of metamorphosis. We call it a “hatch”. It is I a moment where thousands of insects emerge from the flowing water, and are released in a orchestra of movement, freedom…. They are released to fly, love, …
