simple life
strict violation of town burning ordinances, we always had a roaring midnight New Year bonfire in our side yard, a tribute to some ancient instinct to press back the winter darkness, I suppose — inviting friends to toss items they were eager to be free of (broken toys, old love letters, more than one first bad novel) onto the flames, sending up a swirling of glowing sparks of fire to a frozen heaven. Once we even got a brief glimpse of the fabled Northern lights on such a deep winter’s night, as eerie and beautiful as a light in the darkness can get. In her thought-provoking recent book, Learning to Walk in the Dark, veteran preacher Barbara Brown Taylor points out how darkness gets a bum rap from ancient Scripture and modern culture. Holy Scripture paints darkness as metaphorical evil, she notes, while light is seen a symbol of goodness and salvation. To “see the light” is to be saved, whereas to be “lost in the dark” is to be confused or doomed. The fever is always worse at night — and so are the bogeymen inside our over stimulated imaginations. Some of us grew up in America where it was safe to stay out playing after dark, chasing fireflies or kicking the can — but, alas, no more. Owing to 24hour cable news and the evening newscast — little more than police blotters of the air — we collectively fear the unknown terrors that lurk out yonder in the darkness, murderous thieves who would steal anything from your precious children to your flat-screen TV. In one way or another, we’re all afraid to peek beneath the bed. But Barbara Taylor argues persuasively that darkness is not only essential to our physical and spiritual well-being — the place where our weary bones may rest up and heal while our minds make sense of the day’s events — but important time off from the world’s clock when genuine insights and solutions are free to come unbidden in dreams or waking revelation. Jesus ascended from a dark tomb, she points out, wild herds almost always give birth before the wee small hours, and “dark nights of the soul” often lead to life-changing breakthroughs and personal epiphanies.
“Darkness,’ she writes, “turns out to be as essential to our physical wellbeing as light. We not only need plenty of darkness to sleep well; we also need it to be well. The circadian rhythm of waking and sleeping matches the natural cycle of day and night, which affects everything from our body rhythms to our relationships.” Over the years I’ve trained myself — almost — to ignore the common wraiths of worry and that whisper like Shakespeare’s Iago in one’s inner ear long before dawn: Do I have enough saved for retirement? So what’s really enough? Why the hell do I sound like some dude on those insipid investment commercials designed to make us all feel guilty? And what about that funny noise coming from beneath the car . . . The cure for me is to slide out of the sack and leave my bride to her own cozy winter dreams, put on the coffee, let old Rufus the cat in from his nighttime travels, light a candle and happily receive whatever unexpected gifts my journey through the winter night has provided. More than once it’s been a great first line of a book or an answer to a problem that last night seemed just out of reach. As summer’s lease expired early one morning last fall, I was sitting on my wooden garden bench enjoying the sight of a spectacular lunar eclipse when the back door opened and my summer girl stepped outside bundled in her downy hotel robe, bearing cups of coffee to also take in the rare celestial show. A few minutes later we impulsively hopped in the car — Ma in her robe, Pa in his ratty slippers — and gave chase to the vanishing moon all the way to the edge of the Uwharrie hills, returning home in the brilliant golden light of a glorious sunrise. “That was so wonderful,” she said, taking my hand. “Maybe I should always get up in the darkness.” Then she thought about it and laughed. “On second thought, that’s your thing — not mine.” PS Contact editor Jim Dodson at jim@pinestrawmag.com.
PineStraw : The Art & Soul of the Sandhills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . January 2015
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