without light, there is no color

I went to the San Diego zoo yesterday with one of my best girlfriends. It’s something I have wanted to do long before I ever moved to LA. So when I saw a Living Social discounted admission, I snatched it up and got Aubrey to do the same. Of course we bought them back in April and waited mere days before it expired to use it. But we couldn’t have picked a better day. There was hardly anyone there. It was perfectly sunny and about 72 with a cool breeze. Dare I say it was the perfect day?

The first thing we did was hit up the African safari tram ride. I’ve always thought it would be amazing to go on a real safari in Africa. Maybe one day I will. But yesterday I settled on the zoo version. We were on the tram and were lucky enough to have an announcer that very clearly loved her job. Or at least was really good at faking it. Either way, she did a great job of telling us interesting things about the wildlife there. My favorite animals to see were the lions and giraffes. Is the plural of giraffe giraffe or giraffes? That was the ongoing debate for the day. We never did google it. (In case you are curious, apparently both giraffe and giraffes are acceptable forms of the plural.)

We went on to conquer the rest of the zoo. (Apparently the San Diego zoo is not as big as we thought.) We saw every inch of the place and had lunch in about 4 and a half hours. We saw everything from bats that were eating to gorillas munching on bamboo to birds – So. Many. Birds. But what stood out to me the most, what I remember so clearly, is this moment when our tram announcer was telling us about some sort of deer-like animal with horns (don’t quite remember what they were called. Details.) She pointed out that so many of species of animals there “mimicked their backgrounds,” or blended in with their surroundings in order to protect them from predators.

Then we came upon a group of these animals that was a darker grey color and didn’t appear to blend in very well at all. (The babies in this group were born with sandier colored hair that helped them to blend in rather perfectly, and their hair turned darker as they got older. Thought that was pretty genius. Way to go, God.) She was saying that while it didn’t look like the adults were mimicking their background, they were, in fact. When it gets dark at night, they blend right in. Because without light there is no color.

Without light there is no color. These words kept ringing in my head. They seemed so profound…

I think we are like those animals. Sometimes we just want to blend in, have a “normal life,” go with the flow, be safe. I remember when I first told my mom I wanted to be an actress… I had been doing my last 3-hour credit to graduate from UT as a summer intern at an ad agency. I’d been there all of about three days when I decided it wasn’t for me. The conversation went something like this:

INT. ADAMS FAMILY HOUSEHOLD - KITCHEN - NIGHT

SUZANNE, Meredith’s mom, stands in the kitchen making yet another batch of her secret family recipe frozen cookies. 

MEREDITH enters the back door after a long day at the office.

                             SUZANNE
               Hey, how was your day? 

MEREDITH

               I think I want to be an actress.

SUZANNE

               So... not good then?

MEREDITH

               I can’t sit in a cubicle all day. 
               It’s physically and mentally
               claustrophobic. And freezing. Why
               is it so cold? And dark. And did I 

               mention freezing?

SUZANNE

               Well if you don’t like advertising, 

               you could always be a school 

               teacher. You get weekends and 

               holidays! And summers! 

MEREDITH

               I want a job where I am doing 

               something different every day, 

               meeting new people, being 

               creative... doing something I’m 

               passionate about. 

(then)

               What if I’m assigned to the Meow 

               Mix account for the next five 

               years?! I hate cats!

SUZANNE

               Mer, being an actor is a tough and  

               unpredictable road. Sometimes a 

               normal life is nice. A lot of 

               people would kill for normal.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want normal. Normal is boring. I know a lot of people would love to have a normal, boring, predictable life. There’s a lot of struggle in this world. There’s a lot of pain. We don’t have to look far to see it. We don’t even have to look past ourselves. But we can choose to remain in the darkness – to be okay with the status quo, to just get by, to protect ourselves from failure, from heartbreak. Or we can choose to live in the light – to take our life experiences and make the most of our future, to take a chance, to make a difference. We don’t get to choose where we come from. But we can choose where we’re going.

I choose adventure. I choose passion. I choose light. I want to love what I am doing so much that I physically can’t stand to not do it… And that’s how I feel about acting. Acting is my light. It brings out the colors in me. Without light, we can’t see color. It’s not that the colors don’t exist. They don’t magically disappear when it gets dark. They are still there. They’re just hidden. What brings out your colors? What is your source of light?

Of course I can’t think about light without first thinking of Christ. After all, He is the ultimate source of light. He came to be a light to our dark world. To save us from ourselves, from our sins. To rescue us from darkness. “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12.

For you were once in darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light. Ephesians 5:8.