Springtime, Annie Dillard, Communal Greens

It is Easter day and I hope that regardless of your faith or lack of, the day brings you springtime blessings and festive delights. The English term Easter is Germanic--as opposed to Pascal, which is Latinized Hebrew and the dominant term in Romance languages--and has to do with the celebration of nature's rebirth following winter. The pagan tradition--thoroughly modified in the Christian calendar--involved month long fetes for this wondrous time of year. After a long, Northern European winter, the lengthening days, warmer temperatures, softened soil, and bursts of green would easily be sufficiently inspirational for having a good time. It is a ripe time to celebrate the limitations/defeat of the dark forces of death and decay (and damnation according to Christian tradition) .

Such a mood is not only appropriate, but nearly necessary on a day like today. A late frost lined windshields and windows this morning, a brisk wind fluttered in after it, but with the dispersion of clouds this afternoon, blue sky and sharp sunlight seemed to invigorate suggestions of new growth. My mother commented on seeing the same trees on our route to church every week, noting their sly adjustments to the seasons; but I felt that between my route North early this afternoon and my route South about three hours later, I could see the unfurling of green and yellow buds and bundles. I was surprised by the return of the various beady bugs that crash into me on my bicycle and was delighted by the leisurely poses of students on the University Green.

After running a few small errands--returning a film, bike-light batteries, dropping off a letter at the post office--I made my way to the aforementioned campus green behind the UNL Student Union. I have fond memories of the place--a frisbee game with Artskoolers, a free concert, repose taken by the adjacent fountain--and was happy to see a few others enjoying the lush grass and sunshine. It has occurred to me, mostly when I am biking in the middle of the day, that this is my first spring since early childhood that I have not been in school. Never before have I been able to attend to the light of late morning, the drowsiness of a long afternoon, the clarity of an early springtime morning with its bursting greens and yellows. Coincidentally, I have been enjoying Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard during this seasonal blessing; a most appropriate read if ever I have discovered.

Many of my friends have already read Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, which is a poetic, journalistic exploration of Tinker Creek by the author in an unabashed, personal voice. She goes into playful detail and earnest childhood recollection, as well as deftly referring to classical texts and adding quotations from modern thinkers for emphasis. I have thought about posting quotes on Tumblr, but they are simply too plentiful and too lengthy for me to settle. I would inevitably post a good fraction of the book once I got started. As I lounged on the UNL commons, I thought about these things: Dillard talking of the present and of the awakening earth, of not being in school at the moment but returning to one's campus all the same, and the utilization of the commons by so few but--I would suppose--rather contented individuals. And I was pleased.

Communal spaces are difficult but hugely important to foster. Whether they are the semi-public spaces of a large campus, the semi-private spaces of coffeeshops or other small businesses, the private spaces like our apartment last year (that few would argue often became welcoming, common ground for friends, acquaintances, and a few strangers), or the designated public spaces of parks and plazas, common spaces enlist people (I wonder if I should say residents, denizens, citizens, neighbors, community-members, or something else) into a spatial, physical dialogue. Sometimes, as with those of us lounging on the UNL green or the analogues at Gustavus and elsewhere, those connections are tenuous, temporary, and flexible. In other spaces, at other times, such as a discussion or music performance at a coffeeshop or bookstore, those bonds are stronger, tighter, more specific. In each case, though, the space and the participants mutually shape the roles of the other.

In keeping with Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, I might add that weather or season, greenery or design have their own roles to play in constructing a (semi-)common space. I felt so at ease, so peaceful, so collected in an open, simplified space; but I distinctly felt that I was sharing it. In more heterogeneous spaces--as an arboretum--there is a greater suggestion of individuality, privacy, seclusion. In an internal space, where does one engage in a private--but not personal--conversation? Or, how do you frame a space and a collection of people so as to be welcoming, political, social?

Some curmudgeon may argue with me, but something about springtime is almost necessarily social. In the new light we move outside to explore the world and one another anew. Spring and summer love affairs are the result of a medley of mood shifts from environmental stimuli and that daredevil discoverer of a half-forgotten world. Dillard recalls her quest for caddisfly cases, small shells formed by caddisfly larvae composed of surrounding material. Only with the company of a child, one with fresh eyes, is she able to find them; that is until the child's openness to seeing them teaches Dillard to see them. Is it any different when we come out of the winter, eyes at first blinded by the sun, and see the greening, growing, burgeoning, saturated world anew? Are we not forced to assume the spectacles of children and--if only for a fleeting moment--see the world unburdened by our own assumptions?

I am happy, joyous for this season of rebirth. For once, I can meditate on it more clearly having come through a Nebraska winter--Germanic in its own handful of ways--and with my senses tuned for these cunning hints and strident chords of the new, the living. Often, I find satisfaction in the social, seasonal, and pagan connections the Catholic calendar has but does not elucidate. Rarely have I been so clear-headed when I notice the buds bursting, the sun shimmering, the clouds clearing from the suddenly lighter, brighter sky. This rebirth is no less astounding than the Resurrection. Is it more or less beautiful that it is a blessing of vision and regrowth bestowed every year?