A New History

The charm of history and its enigmatic lesson consist in the fact that, from age to age, nothing changes and yet everything is completely different.

Aldous Huxley

I met with the Mayor this morning. Wow, that sounds weird. Certainly doesn't sound like iconoclastic little old me. But I made a good plan, put on my best behavior, even considered wearing my best clothes. (Sorry, I couldn't quite go that far.)

Since my first visit to Beaufort many years ago, I have been enchanted by what is now known as "America's Coolest Small Town". It is an old sea port, established in 1709, and beautifully preserved in keeping with it's historic origins. It's Front Street waterfront is as charming as it is mesmerizing. There are always gorgeous yachts and sailboats; always people coming and going.

It's a town full of salty tales of pirates, shipwrecks, rum running and lighthouses. For me, it was love at first sight, and that infatuation has now grown into a budding relationship.

So......back to the mayor....
Two years ago, we toured Beaufort's recommended spots to become better acquainted with our new home town. Among those spots most recommended was The Old Burying Grounds- the original cemetery for the town.
This sacred ground is laid out under a glorious canopy of Live Oak and Red Cedar. It is a place of quiet ease, shaded from the strong summer sun and cold winter winds. It is a place of rest, for the dead and the living. But maintenance here has been somewhat spotty over recent years, and it looked as though it were begging me to step in and lend a horticultural hand. I presented a simple maintenance schedule to the mayor along with my commitment to get started on the work. I think we have a deal. It will also employ a large assemblage of loyal Beaufort volunteers who love this place as much as I do.

The ages have seen many heroic and historic figures interred here, and some whose stories tug at our heartstrings. Among these are military officers from both sides in the Revolutionary War, Civil War, War of 1812. Included in the stories here are husband and wife separated when he was lost at sea. She remarried, he returned, and they lived out their days with her faithful to her second marriage until death did put them back together again in the grave. Probably the most popular and sweetest memorial is of the girl in the Rum barrel. Her death occurred on the return voyage from England. Her father had promised her mother he would bring her home, so he did, in a Rum cask. http://historicbeaufort.com/burygnd1.htm

I am looking forward to getting back to a big job that involves plants, but in a way that is completely different. It feels like I am stepping in to befriend those grand oaks. But I will also be stepping into history to find my new place in the world. There's plenty to learn and maybe some to teach. I am putting my arms out to these new kindred spirits and we are going to walk hand in hand into the past towards the future. We will breathe life into those stories of the dead and into the roots of their guardians, and make the Old Burying Grounds a wonderful place to visit with them. Come spend an afternoon with us.

A mere compilation of facts presents only the skeleton of History; we do but little for her if we cannot invest her with life, clothe her in the habiliments of her day, and enable her to call forth the sympathies of succeeding generations. ~Hannah Farnham Lee, The Huguenots in France and America

On the Waterfront (for Susan)

 

“In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: 

it goes on.” Robert Frost 

It's been a while since I sat down to the keyboard. Funny thing. I have much more time now than I used to. But the minutes and hours and days between pressing work have been unsettling. I now can catch my breath, but have had to completely stop to recover my words.

Retirement is not relaxation. It is a process that is hard work. So much of who we are revolves around what we do. When that stops, it leaves an anxious, vacuous, ghostly quiet, full of questions I could no longer answer easily, and lists from down deeper that needed making. So I've been letting those waves catch up to me; wash over me; push and pull me along as I find my footing. 

I missed the plants. 

I was sure the plants missed me.

I had learned to read time in the 

tips of buds, 

swelling from one day to the next,

in the phases of the moon across the weeks and months,  

in the changes of light and colors across the seasons.

Lucky for me I landed at the water.

"For whatever we lose (like a you or a me), 

it's always our self we find in the sea."

- E.E. Cummings

Slowly I am finding my way back.  It's all here to be rediscovered and reincorporated. Moments are measured by the swell and ebb of the waves, or an unbroken shell on the beach. Hours are metered by the building clouds, lowering sky, that final shaft of sunlight, the cool calm colors of clearing. 

  

The moon is still here waxing and waning across the days and weeks. The sun still calculates the angles and degrees of the seasons.  

The natural world holds me captive, and continually captivated by the details.

The questions are all inside. The answers are there, too. My lifeline has always been my sweet, ocean going fisherman of a husband, who is ecstatic with our relocation.  I have found buoyancy in the smiles of my grandchildren. They, too, help me refocus on the horizon, with changes, small, smaller, and huge.  

 

While I float a bit to find my bearings, I am right where I need to be. Stroke, breathe, stroke. I'm almost there.

“The best way out is always through.”
― Robert Frost