In the Avett Brothers’ song “St. Josephine" they sing, “If it’s this place or any other/ it’s not where I am/ it’s who I am with.” Company informs our experiences, it charges them with: value, weight, meaning, and transformative powers.
In my experience with nature the most recognizable/prominent company that I have had is my family. Growing up on the farm we were, in some ways, cut-off from the secular world. We (my family) had the house, the land, and each other to fill our days. My brother and I ran in the fields, plotted to sneak up on the cows (but never had the courage to get too close, fearing the immanent and killing stampede that would surely follow our spooking), shot our bows and arrows screaming through the trees at our imaginations, and then hid from it all in the lilac bushes.
The bushes and the petals of the lilac still evoke a personal response from me unlike any other feature the landscape has to offer. The bodies of those bushes 20 years ago were the walls of a castle. The brown bars of twig and vine were hallways, ballrooms, watchtowers, and hidden doorways to our secret “escape passages”.
The baby-purple majesty of the lilac only lasts a couple weeks out of the year. My father used to sneak Cody and I the kitchen shears, and tell us to go cut a few bunches off for our mother, “Hurry, I’ll put some water in the vase boys. It will be a surprise.” He would smile; we would run to the bushes, collect the pretty, and scribble a love note in purple crayon.
We had to be fast—the colors of the lilac live quick lives, they are a moment in the year all too short. This is why they treasured. As soon as you notice the lilac bloom you have to begin to appreciate it or your miss the whole thing. You cannot waste a second marvel.
Every year, in May, whether I see a lilac bush or not I think about the brevity of the glorious moments in our lives. The moments we want to hold on to like hot water in the shower. I will never get to go back to the lilac bush playhouse my brother and I loved so much—never get to crawl under the electric fence to where the cows lived— never work with my father to give my mother flowers, but the lilac’s understated petals are still a treasure. I don’t believe that there is much truth in memories, but the lilac brings me to a fond reflection. I remember how simple life was together (at least in my eyes). Isn’t this the way we are supposed to live? Is it ever possible to maintain anything so simple?
Cory, what a lovely piece of writing. I have a similar relationship with lilacs; especially the smell. It always brings me back several decades, and the blooms never last long enough.
ReplyDeleteI don’t believe that there is much truth in memories
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting statement - ala Proust, if you know Remembrance of Things Past. And it has interesting implications as to how we write about places that we've moved away from, or places that no longer exist to write about. I wonder if, because individual experience of place is so unique and so personal, truth becomes nearly a non-issue. The personal truth of experience seems like truth enough.
Quite lovely, as others have said. Remarkable writing.
ReplyDeleteI'm left wondering if the lilacs are important because they happen to have been around for some biographical details, or if they're important because there's something inherently meaningful about the flowers themselves.
I ask the question because I think you give a great sense of the flower, but I wonder when the lilac gets to speak for itself.
I love this piece b/c of your family ties and the lilac bush. I enjoy the smell of lilacs, and their beauty, and you're right when you say their bloom doesn't last long enough. Loev the Avett Brothers, btw. And don't forget Edward Sharpe and the magnetic zeros: "Home is wherever I'm with you." I thought of this lyric too while I was reading your piece and your familial bond. Thank you for sharing!
ReplyDeleteI know that I treasure most those aspects of the non-human world that are the most ephemeral. To experience those fleeting things - I'm thinking today of forsythia blooming - always feels like a precious gift.
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