Beautyberry
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One of the things I love about living in the south is how beautifully complicated things here can be.
There is so much beauty. The Blue Ridge Mountains, the sandy beaches of the Grand Strand, the rugged beauty of the Gulf Coast, the stunning homes of New Orleans and Charleston and Savannah. The writing of Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor and Zora Neale Hurston and Jesmyn Ward. The art of Thornton Dial and Mose Tolliver. More musicians than I could possibly even start to list, each one better than the last. Food that has literally changed what it means to taste good.
The American South is the inheritor of a legacy - geographic, cultural, culinary, literary, and artistic - that nearly defies description beyond 'real, real good'. This is a place of improbable beauty, a region that seems to inculcate creativity and ingenuity as surely as our humidity follows the heat. I have lived in the south for my entire life. This beauty is what keeps me here, and likely always will.
And. Nothing is just one thing, right?
For all its beauty, the American South has also been the host - indeed, the author - of much of the ugliness in the past (and present) of the American experiment. It was the American South that drove the worldwide slave trade, and it was the South that went to war to try and keep slavery going. It was the South that invented Jim Crow laws and poll taxes and redlining. The American South put the 'system' in systemic racism.
In state houses throughout the South there are ongoing attempts to codify misogyny and homophobia. This is a region that has fought gun control and environmental sustainability, has spearheaded attempts to gut the Civil Rights Act, and seems to think that everything would be a-ok if it was 1955 again.
Beauty. Ugliness. It seems that they go together.
There is a plant that grows natively in the South called the American Beautyberry. There are some growing at our church.
Beautyberry is an apt name. The plant is gorgeous to look at. Around this time every year, the berries ripen. They are these large clusters of pinkish-purple fruit that cluster at the base of large green leaves. The berries are eaten by deer and birds.
This sudden splash of color and life just as we start to make the turn from the dog days of summer and into the mildness of early fall never fails to amaze me. Nature - especially here - has a way of surprising us with sudden, unexpected beauty.
As gorgeous as the beautyberry is, and as tasty as the berries may look (and they do look tasty), I strongly suggest you don't eat any. They are highly astringent and will leave you doubled over with an intense bellyache. You'll live, but you will end up having an unpleasant day - one spent mainly in the bathroom.
Pretty can turn ugly real quick around here.
I suppose that isn't just a Southern thing. It is a human thing. A nature thing. A creation thing. We are surrounded by beauty. And beautiful can turn ugly almost before you register the beauty.
Relationships start with a kiss and then end with a thud. People get fired from their dream job. Vacations can start with sunshine and end in rain. Beautiful places are sometimes filled with ugly ideas and sometimes the most touching art comes from the deepest pain.
We hurt the people we care about. They hurt us. Sometimes we feel alone in a room full of people.
Life is hard, and we all carry beauty and ugliness within ourselves. It's part of the journey here. It is the price we pay for being alive.
In the end we are left with a choice. We can focus on the beauty, or we can focus on the ugly. They are both there all the time. The real question is…
Which one is more important to you? Why?
I have stopped asking people how they are. I have grown tired of hearing the same answer all the time. I ask how someone is... you know what they say? What they say every time? Busy. Everyone says they're busy. I have heard it so much my eyes glaze over when I hear it now.
I am not questioning the truth of their statement. Everyone I know is busy (and I have thoughts on that, but that is another post). The problem, I think, is that ‘busy’ has become a social shield, like ‘fine’ or ‘okay’. A way of saying something true without having to actually share anything meaningful. We humans both love connection and fear real intimacy, because true intimacy requires vulnerability - and trust.
I like to ask people what the best thing in their life is right now. And then I ask what the most challenging thing is. And I listen and I ask follow-up questions. And I will share my own things if asked. My hope is that this produces a more meaningful interaction and, hopefully, encourages vulnerability.
Because, in the end, the cure for the pain of ugliness lies in meaningful, vulnerable, honest connection. One of the sources of beauty is that kind of real connection and authentic community. I think the power of connection and community is something that we have always intuitively understood in the South - for good and ill.
It is late September. The beautyberries are in full flower. I know that if I eat them, I’ll get sick. I also know that seeing them makes me feel well.
My heart is big enough to hold both truths at the same time.
May it ever be so.