Pax Plena

The backyard is awash in purple. Sometime within the past week or so, heaps of tiny little purple buds have poked their heads through blades of grass, heedless of the nighttime temps and the chilly mornings that we still have here in the Midwest.

I’m far from a gardener. It’s safe to say that my green thumb is probably black. I’ve managed to kill succulents, which thrive on neglect, and even the odd cactus a time or two. But there’s something about plants that leaves me intrigued. The thing about plants is that they grow without care to the world around them. They grow where no one planted. They can thrive even in the most inauspicious of places. And their growth persists unimpeded by the “improvements” that we humans try to make to the landscape around us.

Naturally, I was curious to know which tiny purple denizens had opted to call the backyard home. So with a helpful search of my iPhone (14 Pro Max, no less), I discovered that these tiny bulbs are called vinca minor or Periwinkle. When I dug a little deeper – not literally – I read that these small bulbs are considered invasive by several state governments, including the State of Indiana:

Once established, Vinca minor forms a dense carpet to the exclusion of other plants. This creates a problem where it is competing with native flora.

https://www.in.gov/dnr/files/Periwinkle.pdf

According to the state, the solution to dealing with invasive species such as these is to simply rake them up – an inelegant solution that may allow them to resprout. Or, for best practices, just spray them with herbicide to make sure that they are thoroughly irradicated. Regardless of the poison one picks, the message is the same: the plants are “undesirable” and the best option is to simply get rid of them so that more desirable and native plants can reproduce in their stead.

What to do with the Undesirable?

On Easter morning, I can’t help but find myself grateful that God didn’t take the same approach to humanity that the State of Indiana recommends for Periwinkle.

Objectively, I believe that there is ample evidence to suggest that human beings as a species are as corrupt as the day is long. We have a penchant for death and deception. And yet we are paranoid about extending our own lives. We have an inherent fixation with ourselves, yet struggle to make connections with others. More of us are employed and working harder than ever before but that’s a bad thing because it can cost up to $16 for a Big Mac at McDonald’s. And that’s just a review of contradictory headlines from today.

It all reminds me of a Taylor Swift song that any of us could easily sing about ourselves: “It’s me. Hi. I’m the problem, it’s me.”

And that’s where Easter comes in. I don’t think that God is delusional. In response to Taylor, God’s reply is almost certainly the same as the State of Indiana, “yes, the problem is you.” But the there’s more to the Easter song than this.

The rest of the song is that for all of the deception, death, contradiction, paranoia, selfishness, and misguided priorities that we evince in our everyday lives, the God of the universe does not reach the conclusion that we are undesirable. But why?

Because of Jesus.

The Easter message is that Jesus endured the suffering of death for all of the evil that we undertake on a daily basis. He endured suffering for the small misgivings that people experience between one another; and he endured suffering for the large, nation-state evils that we inflict upon one another for large-scale political purposes. To mitigate these, the Easter message is that the God of the Universe destroyed a part of himself to right the ledger of the “undesirable.” And our debt was paid. Undesirable no more, we are loved.

I’ve always thought that the Easter message was one fundamentally of hope. Hope that the end of our physical existence is not the end of existence itself. Hope that the mistakes of the past need not be the mistakes of tomorrow. And hope that when life on Earth finally winds up, that good will prevail over evil.

I didn’t rake up the periwinkle. I didn’t spray them with herbicide. I smiled because I loved them. I loved their color. I loved their persistence. And I loved their company.

I think that’s how God feels about us.

I’m back in Tucson this month for work. It’s my busiest time of the year. My program hosts some 19 different courses throughout the month of January on topics related to Indigenous governance. This makes for long days, and working on weekends. Lots of mitigating faculty and student concerns, and making sure that things go smoothly.

My evenings, are spent resting from the long day. I grab dinner, and then get ready for the next day. It’s a fairly monastic existence that gets broken up by saying goodnight to my Son, and watching whatever happens to be on TV. Last night it was the Cowboys game, and Dallas won so no complaints.

It actually reminds me very much of the time that I lived here before the pandemic.

As a former city-dweller, I found that I was constantly surrounded by people, but had almost no interaction with them. A part of that’s my nature. Introversion has always come pretty easily to me. But I also think it’s partly the nature of cities. Without the right support of family and friends, cities can be an isolating experience.

Life is obviously very different now. I am a remote employee and live in Indiana. I see my son regularly and am seldom lonely. I still have a lot of awesome friends here in Tucson. But now, I am with my son and this brings me a lot of joy.

I guess there are always trade offs. Sometimes the trade offs are for the good.

I’ve been on a trip the past couple of weeks visiting friends in Virginia. We opted to take a roadtrip to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee to catch a dinner theater performance, and visit Dollywood. It was a fun slice of Americana, complete with over the top Christmas lights and outlet mall shopping. I did manage to snag a pretty cool pocket knife – so no complaints.

But what was the most meaningful part of the trip to me, aside from the time spent with my friends, was a day drive we took to visit The Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

I wasn’t unfamiliar with the Great Smoky Mountains. My Grandfather’s people, the Cherokees, called the area home from time immemorial through the Indian Removal Act and the Trail of Tears in 1830. Even after, some bands of Cherokees remained, taking to the Appalachian hills and making a life among the thousands of acres forests, creeks, and valleys in the southeastern United States. Having visited, it was very easy to understand why some chose to remain. The place is nothing if not peaceful. A refuge lost to time.

The park takes its name from the natural fog that results from the park’s trees and vegetation. The fog hovers over the mountains, making them look bathed in smoke from afar and even from within the park itself.

Far from it though.

The air was fresh and crisp with a hint of November chill. It smelled of pine and growth, and of the soil that has eroded from the craggy terrain for millennia.

In all, it was a place mostly undisturbed by mankind spare the roads and few visitors taking in its wonder on a cold day. The quiet streams and rivulets ran throughout the park, paying no heed to the passing cars. The rustle of branches in the wind gave greeting as we drove, accented by the occasional warble of mischievous bird overhead.

The mountains themselves are said to be the oldest in the world. I suspect the Cherokees would agree with this sentiment. The fog and the air give the mountains a certain natural stateliness that is coupled with mystery and grace. They seem to look out over the vast Tennessee landscape toward the resort towns of Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge with a kind of bemused wonderment at the bustle of the world going on around them. And yet, within the park reserve, life goes on as it always has. Nature’s cycle continues apace. The streams continue to bubble over the rocks that have been there since the foundations of time were set.

I think if I had my druthers and could shuck off the fetters of responsibility that anchor me to my lived reality, I would transport myself back to 1830. I would build myself a little cabin along side one of the babbling brooks and make my home from the land.

Of course, armed with no knowledge of how to do this, I probably wouldn’t last very long. As Will Ferrell said in a recent movie, January was the leading cause of death in the 1800s. But there’s something about the ancientness of the place that conjures the romantic latent even in my calloused soul. I am mindful, though, of my own, human tendency to romanticize the past. It’s easy to think that prior eras and generations were really the golden age in which to live. I suspect that sometime in many years hence, future generations will look back at this current era and yearn for it in the way that I do the pre-1830s Smoky Mountains.

So, rather than wish for a bygone era, I resolved to be grateful for the existence of such a place, and thought about how fortunate I was to set foot on the lands of my ancestors. I hope that in 2123 the waters will still meander through the park, and that the fog of the mountains will still entice visitors with mystery.