A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
TLDR: Kim and Rachel fell in love because of an eastern screech owl and now it's our logo.
I first met Kim at an LGBTQ+ Healthcare Seminar that I hosted for my previous job. She stood in the back of the room, even though there were plenty of chairs, leaning against the wall. It was my first seminar like this for the community, and I was pretty nervous. During the Q&A section, I noticed that Kim asked a question which the healthcare providers really had to think about before responding. Her question didn't put them on the defensive, just shifted their perspective a little bit. And I thought, "Hmm…that was a very smart question. She seems interesting."
I saw Kim again a few weeks later at a slam poetry event at Ball State. I leaned against the wall near where she was sitting, but she did not notice me. She was busy jamming to the slamming.
A couple months after that, my boss assigned me to join the board of directors of Muncie OUTreach. When I attended the first board meeting, Kim was there. She didn't hesitate to introduce herself to me and gave me her business card which had her personal cell phone number on it. I put it on my fridge and for days wondered if I should text her. Did she want me to text her? Is that why she gave me her card? It was agony.
I felt butterflies around my heart when I would see her at OUTreach. She always talked to me and helped me feel more comfortable in my own skin. So I tried to woo her the Wisconsin way. I bought her cheese from my hometown cheesemaker. This smooth move would surely make her fall in love with me. When Kim pulled into my driveway to pick up the cheese, she said, "I have a meeting to go to and I'm running late. How much do I owe you?" I handed her a paper bag with 5 pounds of cheese through her driver’s door window and shyly replied, "It's a gift." She said, "Thanks." And she peeled out of my driveway like a bat out of hell.
Then a piece of luck…my neighbor pointed out an eastern screech owl nesting in a redbud tree across the street from my house. I thought, "This is my chance. Kim loves birds." I texted her, "Do you want to come over and see a screech owl?" She was at my house within minutes with her binoculars and chatting with me on my front steps. We started hanging out more, but I wasn't really sure what to do next to take our friendship to the next level.
One night after I had long gone to bed, Kim sent me a message, "I like you more than friends. If you feel the same way, let's go on a date." In the morning, I saw the message and thought, "Well, that's a pretty good way to take a friendship to the next level." After agonizing over my reply, I wrote back, "I'd like that."
Later I asked Kim if she had been able to sleep that night after she asked me out. She said, "What do you mean? Of course." It was a genuine question. It did not occur to her to be anxious about it.
When we asked Aimee to make us a logo for Two Birds, it obviously had to include the bird that brought us together. As Aimee talked me through their design, they pointed to the Kim owl and said, "I wanted to make this one look fun and spontaneous to capture Kim's personality." Then they pointed to the Rachel owl and said, "And this one is more…well…" I said, "Uptight?" Aimee laughed uncomfortably because we both knew it was true.
There are several morals to this story.
When your first (or second or third) attempt at something fails, that doesn't mean it won't work out eventually.
Self-doubt makes things much, much harder than they need to be.
I will always be more uptight than Kim and that’s okay.
Be bold. Be brave. Be yourself.
A message from your friendly neighborhood OWLs
