Ugly?

Our little family recently visited the Oakland Zoo; we had never been and wanted to take them to a zoo that was new to them. It was a really great zoo! Although Joei Kate was concerned about the lack of the Ostrich. I concur.

At any rate, they have a huge Bat exhibit! Needless to say, after looking at more bats than one person should see in their lifetime, I felt itchy. And scared. And like things were crawling on me. But I digress.

Fruit bats are uuuuuugly (said like the Hyena from The Lion King.) I mean, U.G.L.Y you aint got no alibi, you ugly. Hey hey, you ugly. Did I mention how ugly they are?

They just hang from the fence, upside down, wings wrapped around them all snuggly like; which is good cuz aint nobody else gonna snuggle a bat. Some of them would open their wings and they were massive! And veiny and gross. And ugly.

Once we moved past the ugliness (Ok, I never really moved past that) and my husband's extreme urge to shoot them, (yes, apparently a hanging fruit bat just screams to him "SHOOT ME NOW") I started to read about the fruit bat.

They have purpose. As ugly and freaky as they are, those suckers have purpose. They fly around, eating fruit and spitting seeds and parts of said fruit all over, thereby pollinating fields, and giving us fruit. They help forests, they help plants, they help us. We don't even realize how much we need the fruit bat to exist in our world, but we do.

I'll admit, my first instinct was to look past the exhibit, not to even pay attention to the creepy bat that my husband longed to shoot. But I was so intrigued by the ugly I had to look closer.

I often think the same thing can be said for people. Not the ugly part, because I don't believe anybody is ugly. I don't even use that word much, except when talking about bats. And spiders. And as I also discovered at the zoo, millipedes. But I don't say ugly much. It's not a word I care for.

That being said, like that fruit bat, we often look past people. We make a snap judgement on a person, based on their outward appearance, or our perception of them. Maybe they are different than us. Maybe they dress different than what we think works. Maybe their personality is the polar opposite of ours. Maybe they just don't fit in. Ohhhh. You expect to hear that last statement when in the midst of a group of teenagers right? "They just don't fit in."

Sadly it's not just amongst teenagers, it's everywhere. It's in our homes, in our schools, in our communities and sadly, in our churches. They just don't fit in. Tears come to my eyes as I type this because I've seen it happen all too much, and I'll admit that I've been guilty of it as well.

You ever been the one "that just didn't fit in?" I have. And it's ugly.

The fruit bat has purpose. How much more purpose do we have? If God created that fruit bat for a reason, than my goodness, what did He create us for? Oh if we even had but a glimpse of the greatness that resided in each individual person, can you imagine what this world could be? Greatness. Not ugly. Not creepy. Greatness.

So I learned a lesson that day at the Oakland zoo. Well, I learned a few actually. I learned that my handsome man really likes to shoot things. Thankfully, not people. Most the time.

I also learned that Lily will more than likely be the person that breaks into the zoo at night to free the animals - as she screamed "The camels were made for the desert, not the Zoo, that's why they are asleep!" We will wake up one day to Elephants in our backyard. It's inevitable.

And I learned that something that has caused me fear, and many others, has purpose. The fruit bat, creepy as it is, has purpose.

Maybe, just maybe, the fruit bat isn't so ugly after all.