There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart. ~Celia Thaxter

This past Saturday I was standing on the beach at Sapelo Island off the coast of Georgia. It was an absolutely perfect summer day. We had taken the ferry over from the mainland early in the morning, before the rolling, sun-shot mists had fully cleared from the marshes and spits of land we passed. Indeed, even Sapelo itself brooded under that same, luminous vapor, the dark line of its trees an indistinct blur beneath an alchemy of warmth and humidity and something not quite canny. Only the spire of the lighthouse stood out against all that witchery, solid and undaunted, a thing very firmly of this earth. The sight of it made me feel that we were, indeed, traveling to a real place, and not just a vanishing figment of Brigadoon-like fancy. I stood at the helm by my husband’s side, cherishing the sunlight, and the wind that was wreaking havoc with my hair, and the purple martins wheeling overhead, dropping bits of song as they dipped and swung through the air in the most graceful bird ballet imaginable.

The landing was a vibrant melee of greetings and arrivals, the mountainous suitcases and crates of returning residents and the shouldered packs and bags of day-trippers like us. I was taken with the island’s energy the moment we set foot on its shore—it was a palpable thing, generations in the making, and though Sapelo only boasts a population of around 50 in the most generous of calculations, it’s been so thoroughly inhabited by those who have lived there that one is rather awed by the tenacity of such fierce love and pride. It’s almost as if the hard lines of distinction between the people and the place have grown so thin that it’s difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins. I felt a strange, wordless sympathy with these jostling fellow passengers of mine—I, too, have known the love of an island, though my residence can only be measured in weeks, not years. But it doesn’t take long to be taken by a place in a way that will never let you go. In my case—with my island—it had been a matter of moments.

Summer afternoon - summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language. ~Henry James

Sapelo was truly beautiful, in a wild, unnamable, unmanageable way. Plenty of moss-hung oaks to suit my fancy, and stands of lovely, olive-colored slash pines with their twisting branches and exquisite little cones. But it wasn’t until we came to the beach that I really began to feel the place open its heart to me: a sweeping curve of silver-white sand, flanked by snowy dunes crowned with the nodding plumes of feathery sea oats. The sky arched blue and cloudless over all that white and green, and only the faintest hints and shreds of mist on the horizon gave evidence of the morning’s light-filled shrouding. It looked like the place had never been troubled by the least human intrusion—indeed, were it not for the quiet clutches we met on the boardwalk and along the sand, one might be tempted to think that civilization had never so much as set eyes on the place.

Arriving with the turn of the tide, we had come upon the jovial, milling aftermath of a Gullah ocean baptism service. The children, freed from such late solemnities, were flinging themselves into the waves with a wildness of joy that literally made my heart ache. Their shrieks filled the stately silence of the place like music; their dark limbs flashing in and out of the water were as graceful and un-self-conscious as the rhythmic movements of deer passing between the shades of a wood. They made me think of the silvery whiting glimpsed off-shore in summer, springing out of the ocean in an apparent ecstasy of flight, only to vanish before you are quite sure you’ve seen them. I watched the mad antics for a while until their mothers began calling them out of the waves—and, doubtless, home to meals the rest of the world can only dream about—and then I turned away with a yearning that bordered on envy.

I envied them more than their delectable midday dinner; I wanted their wildness and freedom, their absolute unconcern for the responsibilities and respectabilities of grown-up life.

I coveted their uncontested, eternal possession, which is summertime itself.

Summer and I haven’t been on very friendly terms in recent years. Slowly, imperceptibly, I’ve let my early love for it become choked by the weeds of discomfort and discontent. I’ve gotten grouchy over the weather (too much rain or not enough of it), the humidity (which can really be a Southern girl’s friend, if she will only cooperate with it), the sad reality of overly-ambitious, unmet goals. (And that’s not even touching on the bugs. I am a walking mosquito-feast.) For several years running, I’ve gotten mired in the dog days and gone gasping into the blessed relief of September like an exhausted runner tumbling over the finish line.

In short, I’ve lost the magic, the charm that children know, that makes summer one long, endless idyll.

But this summer was different, shiningly, strikingly so. It had nothing to do with circumstances or lack of difficulties—in many ways it was one of the hardest summers of my life. Perhaps that is why God in his grace saw fit to give so lavishly of what my soul was so parched for. He gave me the sea: the coast of Georgia and my own beloved island, in an unprecedented abundance. The timeliness of it all overwhelmed me with a gratitude I could scarcely name: the novel I am working on is set in this part of the world, and while I know it like the back of my hand, the gift of so many weeks spent in the vicinity is a favor I am determined to acknowledge with a long winter of hard work.

“If it could only be like this always – always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe and Aloysius in a good temper...” ~Evelyn Waugh

I’ve been salt-kissed and windblown and I’ve grown so brown I hardly know myself. I’ve eaten freshly boiled shrimp with my fingers on the beach and more oysters on the half shell than I care to confess. I’ve romped in the ocean with my dog, and I’ve sailed around the dance floor of an exquisitely-appointed room in my husband’s arms to the music of a jazz quartet. I’ve lived for weeks at a time in bathing suits and sundresses and I’ve actually watched the sunset, not merely noticed it in passing. I’ve read fluffy novels and I’ve journaled like mad and I’ve given myself the permission to merely sit on the beach and think. Of nothing.

The cure for anything is salt water—sweat, tears, or the sea. I wish I had said that, but Isak Dinesen beat me to it. Oh, but it’s true. I have been cured of many things during these weeks by the sea, healed in ways I can only begin to suspect at this point. Old barnacled accumulations, old insecurities and insincerities have fallen away, shed like the hermit crab’s shell, and I’ve been filled, replenished and reoriented in a way I have never known. I’m so grateful, so eager to pour these gifts of grace into my life and work at home. I know what the Psalmist meant when he said he was literally weighted down with blessings.

But on this particular day, standing on Nanny Goat Beach at Sapelo Island, I felt a sudden loss. A cold sadness clutched me, there in the midst of all that warmth and beauty. Watching the children play, feeling the water cool against my bare feet and turning my face to the kindness of the sun, something desperate rose up inside of me. I looked to the south, towards an island I couldn’t see but knew was there, an emerald set upon a golden band of salt marsh. Then I turned to Philip, my big white sunglasses dropped down over my burning eyes.

“I’m not ready to be done—with this,” sweeping my arm towards the sea. “With summer.”

He understood. The day before we had left Jekyll Island behind us and come to a charming little port town we often visit, beloved in its own right. But it wasn’t Jekyll. When we checked into our little inn overlooking the Altamaha, I smiled bravely, laughing at my own sentiment. But inside I felt bereft, bereaved. Homesick. I had promised Philip that I wouldn’t disgrace myself when we were leaving the island—he teases me that the people at the hotel must think he’s awfully mean to me, the way my happiness in that place seems to overflow in such a watery way at the least prompting. As we had come over the causeway, however, in the opposite direction my heart wanted to be going, the silent tears had run down my cheeks one after another. It’s never easy to leave, but it’s excruciating when I don’t know when I’ll return. At other times I can blow a kiss over my shoulder with relative composure, steel myself for the long drive home with plans and schemes for maximizing the time between this visit and our next. But on this August day, with the late afternoon sun turning the water to silver and the marshes to gold, I just didn’t know. And I wasn’t sure I could bear it.

We thoroughly enjoyed the rest of our stay on Sapelo and took the ferry back, tired and happy and dewy with a glazing of sunscreen and bug spray. We had lunch at a sidewalk café, and as elegant dinner plans were in the offing (it was our last evening before heading home the next day) we both agreed that naps were in order. But first we wandered into a couple of shops on the miniscule main street. Browsing the aisles of a book stall, I innocently picked up a tome on the area and flipped it open—right to the chapter on Jekyll Island. I turned a page and stared down at an image of my favorite beach in the whole world. I felt the tears rising, sensed that ominous burning in the back of my throat, and I knew that in another moment I’d be utterly undone. I closed the book and hastily returned it to its place. It hurt too much to think of Jekyll being so near—not thirty miles away and—

And in that instant I had an idea, one of those inspirations that simply will not be gainsaid. I hurried out of the shop and found Philip, who was already wandering through an antique store across the street. The moment he saw me he knew something was up.

“Uh-oh,” he grinned. “She’s got that Jekyll look in her eye.”

That man knows me better than I know myself.

I spilled my plan in a tumble of excitement while he grinned and shook his head.

“Well, I wasn’t up for a big dinner, anyway,” he laughed. “But I’d better get that nap in!”

So while he went back to the room, I set my lovely scheme in motion. First I ducked into the little wine shop on the main street and picked out a nice bottle of red and a round of local brie. When the woman behind the counter learned that it was for a picnic—and such an impromptu one, at that—her eyes kindled in a sympathetic smile. With the air of a sudden ally, she tucked two paper plates into the bag, a stack of napkins, two plastic cups and a knife for our cheese.

Across the street at the olive gourmet, I explained my plan all over again, and met with the same kindness and enthusiasm. The proprietress entered into the spirit of things, turning out a freshly-baked loaf of artisan bread, a collection of Greek olives, a jar of homemade tomato bisque (“delicious at room temperature”) and a couple of ice-cold Izzy sodas. Into the bag went two plastic spoons and two York Peppermint Pattys for dessert. (I pinched a couple of paper bowls from the breakfast area of our inn for the soup, lest you imagine we ate it out of the jar.)

“One must maintain a little bittle of summer, even in the middle of winter.” ~Henry David Thoreau

Moments later we were dressed for dinner in bathing suits and cover-ups, our little roadster speeding towards Jekyll like a martin to its gourd. When we arrived on the island again my heart leapt with as much joy as if it had been an exile of months—years—and not a mere 24 hours. I felt I had been given something very precious to hold and that I must not drop the least moment. And just as in all of our most timeless times, I knew there was a dash of eternity in it. We drove around to the north end of the island, took the long and well-loved path to the beach, and spread our little blanket under a familiar arch of driftwood. We swam and laughed and walked and remembered—and ate! My goodness, we ate. The feast we had forgone at a nice restaurant was nothing to this banquet of pure beauty spread out before us. That same cerulean sky that had smiled over us all day; the waves rolling gently into the tidal pools and the whiting flinging themselves out of the sea for joy. The sun setting over our shoulders behind the line of trees, washing that boneyard of writhing driftwood with a stain of saffron and rose. We slathered our crusty bread with brie and sipped our wine out of plastic cups, and felt like the heir and heiress of the whole world.

"Summer's lease hath all too short a date." ~Shakespeare

It was a microcosm of the summer’s gifts; a strong, golden-hued cordial distilled from a harvest of sunlit days. And with that one, final grace, my cup overflowed in wordless prayer. Thank You, thank You, thank You…

When the light and the tide told us it was time to go, I took one, last, long look around. Then I smiled up at Philip, not bravely this time, but easily, happily, like a sun-sated child. We walked back along the shore in a contented silence, and as we turned into the sandy path I blew a kiss to the beach over my shoulder. I didn’t know when I would be back. I only knew I would. And that was enough.

It still hurt to leave. But as we went over the bridge, I looked back and saw the lights from the hotel shimmering out like fairy lamps among the live oaks. And in the sky above, a heavy, red moon hanging low over my island, spilling its amber wealth over the water like a bridge of light.

Summer must really be over when you see a moon like that, I thought with a sigh.

But I’ll never be done with this summer. The tan and the bug bites will fade; my hair will lose some of the highlights the sun gives out for free. But this summer has left its permanent mark on me. I’m more myself than I have been in years. And I will never be the same again.

"When summer gathers up her robes of glory, and, like a dream, glides away." ~Sarah Helen Whitman

Some days are just kind of stupid.

You sit there early, hands cupped around a half-mug of cold coffee, feeling that the world beyond your own bed is exhausting. And perhaps just a little bit insupportable. Vacations, among other things, will do that do to you.

You haven’t the heart to consult the best-laid-plan you made so cheerfully the night before. (And well past your bedtime, I might add.)  You know it’s just way too long.

And too optimistic.

And perfectionistic.

You contemplate last night’s dishes crowding the sink and you very sensibly decide to take a walk. And then you come right back inside, beaten and subdued by August itself before you’re fairly out of the gate.

Some days are just like that.

Some days you have to close the cover on your screaming day planner and walk past the dishes like they’re not even there. You have to drive with the top down and the music up. (Kind of loud.) You make an impulsive date with a dashingly handsome man you are wildly in love with (and who happens to be your husband).

Some days there is simply nothing to be done but to put on his favorite dress and sip champagne over a stolen lunch.

Some days you need to stop and look at the things you have loved all your life like you have never seen them before. And remember why you love them.

Some days you need a cold dog nose under your hand and some days you need a soft blanket and a fluffy book. And some days you need a spritz of fancy perfume.

Today was one of the latter. And like a tiny vacation of its own, it lifted me out of the everyday muck and mire of post-vacation blues and plunked me down with wonder into the gift of the moment.

We’ve been away for a while, out gallivanting along the coast in our Airstream. For two weeks I sat on the beach and watched the tide come and go and slowly digested Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s Gift from the Sea. (More on that later. I hope.) She gave me a lot to think about, but one of the most striking points was something I’ve already felt God stirring in my own heart all summer: the necessity of living in the moment, as that is the only place that life is to be found. Nearly sixty years ago she made the point that Americans on the whole are very bad at this:

Perhaps the historian or the sociologist or the philosopher would say that we are still propelled by our frontier energy, still conditioned by our pioneer pressures or our Puritan anxiety to “do ye next thing.”

Lindbergh contrasts this frantic race for the future (be it next year or next month or the next moment—“Ah, then I will begin to live!”) with the atmosphere of Europe, constrained by the horrors of two world wars (and another half-century of turmoil, I might add) into a forced appreciation of the present: “A golden eternity of here and now.” This is an extremely simplistic commentary on both her words and the historical characteristics of Europe and America, but I really think she’s on to something. All I have to do is look across the Pond to my European friends (and remember the life I’ve lived intermittently and occasionally among them) to believe she’s right. If I had to name something quintessentially European, it would be that gift they possess of living in the moment. Being fully present. “Even if it means merely a walk in the country on Sunday or sipping a cup of black coffee at a sidewalk café.”

The world has gotten bigger since the post-war days in which Anne’s words were penned (or smaller, depending on how you want to look at it) but the significance of the moment we’re in is no less glorious than it ever has been or ever will be. It is the superlative masterpiece of God’s gift of life; it is the place where joy stabs us and sorrow keens us awake. It is holy, kindled with sacred fire.

It’s all we have.

My present today of a pretty dress and a quick lunch with my husband is now past. But I will remember that smack in the middle of a very busy day we held hands and talked about someday. And it made today so very sweet.

Some days are just kind of teeming and pulsing with the miracle.

And that’s when we know that they all are.

My husband and I have recently returned from an extended stay on one of the barrier islands of Georgia. I’ve been visiting this beloved part of the world my entire life, but this one island in particular for the past two decades, without a lost year among them. I honestly could not believe it when I realized that fact (and how keen we are to the signs and markers of our own existence!), but twenty years just seems like such a milestone to me. Such a tender vantage-point from which to consider not only who I’ve become over all that span of time, but also what this island has consistently meant to me–I love it like no other spot on earth. I’ve been making the attempt since I was seventeen to put into words the unique beauty of this place that is so much a part of me. Alas, never to my satisfaction–my journals are filled with half-fledged raptures and awkward attempts–but I’ve been trying, nonetheless. I can’t help it. I know this place, and I am known of it. I imagine the longing to express my love for it will haunt me for the rest of my life. And I’m so glad. But one of the things I wanted to do upon so meaningful an anniversary was to try and commit my feelings to verse. It’s not what I would like it to be, not nearly. Some things are just too precious to confine to words, and the greater my loves, the more I feel my inadequacies. I realized at the outset, though, that I can’t put everything this island is to me into one poem: it would take volumes to do that. So I honed it down, whittled my words into one clear channel. And what resulted was nothing more nor less than a love song for an Island. I hope you enjoy it.

Living God! Was there ever a world of such grace?
          The beauty of a thousand summers lives on here,
                    with the souls of all their flowers,
                              and the heady young glory of my own greening spring.

My past waits on through all the long winter of exile,
          brooding under moss-hung trees and haunting the cloistered shades
                    with a memory of joy too tender to be told.
I find it once more—and my own self with it—not in the slow gathering
          of unforgotten days, no quaint posey of remembrance, delicate and intentional,
                    but all in a rush, in one greedy draught of golden air,
                              sailing over the causeway like a homing bird.
It assails me with an embrace that takes my breath
          and never fails to summon a spring of tears.

How kindly this jeweled Isle has kept my times, whole days of deathless joys
          and hours so precious this world seems scarcely large enough to hold them.
Surely it was a dream: that age, that innocence, that marsh-skirted island itself—
          so my winter-soul speaks amid the cold despoiling of earth and tree.
                    Surely life was not meant for such sweetness.

But I have only to catch a wandering breath of jasmine on the breeze,
          or a lemon-thrill of magnolia, or even (or mostly)
                    the Maytime gift of lowly privet,
                              to doubt my own doubts and laugh my unbelief in the face.
Before such sweet convincing flee my land-locked thoughts,
          like wind-tossed foam scattering over a silver shore.

But, ah! To come—to feel the sun’s wealth falling warm upon my upturned face,
          To drink the cordial of the salt-laced air and see the curtained moss
                    waving and parting in welcome—
is resurrection; a revival of the deepest things, as real as the awakening fern
          that inhabits the boughs of these legend oaks, kissed alive by rain and dew,
                    furled fronds unwithering in a sudden flowering of green.
This is my gift, my grace of this undying place. My hoarde, my fairy gold,
          that makes me rich beyond compare.

All this, o Island-world, set like an emerald upon your filigreed marsh,
          you give without stint in astonishing candor, baring your verdant heart
                    to those who love you.
And who among such swains more ardent than I, who loves the very sand-loam
          of your soil, and your life-teeming shallows,
                    and the spring of your grass beneath my feet?

I remember that early wonder, leaping unfettered from an ingenuous soul,
          the first time I found you here, dreaming of your own youth
                    upon a golden-hazed sea.
I was young enough then to believe all the promises of spring, to feel without fear,
          so that the untested ardor of my overfull heart raced forth to greet you
                    in sister-love, lavish as you in my warmth.
No check on the reins of joy, save a maiden modesty, beneath which glowed
          the coals of a blossoming passion for life.

Oh, seventeen! To know once more your frank-eyed vision, your hopefulness
          for all life’s love! I meet you here again, amid my flowers and trees,
                    see your winsome face smiling back at me across a score of years—
unfathomable chasm! Sorrows sleep there little dreamt of in your sweet simplicity.
          But more mercies—oh, so many more—quickened and kindling to a blaze
                    by which my life is lighted.

You—whose quandaries could be settled over a cup of tea, whose starry eyes
          thought to comprehend the universe with a span—you could not know
                    what wine the world had to offer,
or with what brooding love your heart would be plowed and sown. I’d not give
          my dreams for yours, to have these losses unlearned or these mercies unmet.
                    No, not for the very stars your eyes had the witchery to command.

And yet, for all that, one liquid cadence, spilling in rapture from the throat of a bird,
          swinging low over the golden grass with a flare of scarlet wing,
                    and I am undone.
Shot through by an envoy flashing past, while he, unmindful of my wound, trails
          the music of my youth behind him in careless effulgence.
I rouse in rebellion, beating my wings against the cage of years,
          courting folly in the midst of wisdom with a mad longing for all that is past.

But if time is relentless, eternity is its thief, stealing back all our hours
          for one glorious whole, for which youth is but surety in pledge. If such
                    be the case—and joy itself teaches me it is so,
and beauty, and the clear eyes of a girl—then I’ll take such sweet stings and welcome,
          with a smile for all they signify.

Twenty years between that day and this, and I come no more alone, hedged round
          with fancy, eyes for none but my dreams. My heart has opened wide,
                    expanded, unfurled her reefed sails,
to welcome one other, dearer, o Island, than you, and you all the dearer in his light.
          I’ve given the honeysuckle of my girlhood for a womanly profusion of gardenia,
                    spilling a fragrance unlooked for, and safe visions have grown up into
                              vagabondry, even amid our quiet ways.

Lone bird no longer, I sail with him wing and wing, a twin-masted schooner,
          lithe and lighthearted, running with the wind down all that ecstasy
                    of unknown ways.
Many paths through the sea, many points of sail our lot, becoming more his
          and more my own as we chart our course through waters fair and fell.

And wander where we might, here kindly harbor awaits, where, resting
          on the green bosom of an island, we will remember all your sweet love
                    and the selves that we are in your arms.
And so, Island-love, I give back your gifts, lifting my heart as freely as yours. I’ve seen
          your marsh in full tide, offering up all that blue to the sky—serene and trusting—
                    and so you have taught me to live, unafraid.

On the second-to-the-last day of September, in the year of our Lord 2011, I came into possession of a hill in the English countryside.

I marked the event that evening with all due solemnity and appropriate honors. My husband and I had ostensibly walked out in the late afternoon to watch the sunset from a neighboring slope, but with a few quick modifications, and all the young joy of a first-time hill-owner, I adapted it into a celebration. I cut a few swinging strands of ivy that hung over the rutted path we took from our cottage, and as soon as we had spread our blanket on the grassy prospect, I sat down and began weaving them into a coronet. Philip grinned a little ruefully as I studded it with tiny thistles—the bane of any pasture-keeper’s existence; the amethysts and jasper of the woodland lapidary. But when I opened our tea caddy and produced, not the expected and well-traveled thermos and tin cups, but a bottle of champagne, his smile registered genuine surprise.

“This is a momentous occasion,” I said gravely, attempting to loosen the cork and then passing it to him in a sudden fear of flying consequences. “It’s not every day you come into property.”

I had wanted it the moment I had seen it: that green, sweeping hill, mounting in an undulation of gentle swales to a point dark among the hedges. The longing had leapt up in me with a thrill of pain and joy and I knew it had to be mine, right down to the least blade of grass. And not the hillside only, but the lane by which I had reached it, overarched by chestnuts and wizened holly trees, and the cottage it led from, buried in a steep fold of the Dorset hills. I wanted the orchard I came through and all its ripe burden of sun-warmed fruit. I wanted the sunlight itself, falling dapple-dazzling in pools of wealth upon the landscape and I wanted the blue bowl of sky arching cloud-swept above. I was inexorable in my demands: I even required the very lambs and ewes with which it was populated, grazing in ceaseless content upon its verdant slope.

The transaction had gone through without a hitch—and completely unbeknown to the thoroughly lovely and gracious couple that occupied the land. The husband, a gentleman farmer of the old school, even witnessed the proceedings from afar, hailing me from his tractor as he chugged off down into the hollow, and hadn’t the least suspicion what I was up to.

It wasn’t the first time I had experienced such an overmastering and irresistible passion for ownership. In like manner, I had snatched up every last Canova in the Louvre, and the Alpen-crowned sapphire of Italy’s Lake Como. I had collected a red sandshore on Prince Edward Island and a time-forgotten homestead in the Shenandoah Valley and an entire jewel of an island off the coast of Georgia. I had even managed to purchase, in a happy circumstance of exceedingly good fortune, a certain majestic cedar tree, gleaming out from a dawn-lit mist and hung with diamonds of rarest dew. This last was a steal, and genuinely rare, for I found it in my own backyard.

The cork flew off the bottle with a festive pop and we watched it soar straight over our heads like a springing lark. I retrieved it from the grass at my side and dropped it into the tea caddy as a souvenir.

“I’m landed gentry,” I told Philip, lifting my glass to a level with the departing sun and watching the rose-tinted light flit and sparkle among the bubbles. “In good standing and by all the inviolable laws of fairyland.”

In his elegant collection of essays, The Art of Travel, Alain de Botton observes that this insatiable yearning for acquisition in the face of overwhelming beauty is common to the human condition. “A dominant impulse on encountering beauty,” he writes, “is to wish to hold on to it, to possess it and give it weight in one’s life. There is an urge to say, ‘I was here, I saw this, and it mattered to me.’”

I had never heard it expressed that way, but de Botton’s words were a wind upon the Aeolian harp of my deepest sensibilities, and I knew by the hints of that far-off song that he was on to something. Perhaps something bigger and truer than even he imagined.

He went on to recount how John Ruskin had considered this phenomenon and had concluded that there was a respectable and thoroughly effective means of satisfying such an insatiable craving: to look deeply enough into the beauty to gain an awareness of its specific elements and effects, and to make the attempt to express it artistically.

In other words, to see, and to describe what you have seen.

This was Ruskin’s motivation, both in his teaching and his drawing manuals: to help others to see. To open their eyes and to loosen their fingers. To ‘direct people’s attention accurately to the beauty of God’s work in the material universe.’ He espoused two particular mediums for this endeavor, sketching and ‘word-painting’. (Photography was initially advocated, as well, until it became apparent to him that the general enthusiasm was leaning all-too-precariously towards the temptation to let the camera do all the seeing.) And in both cases, he was adamant on one point: natural aptitude and talent were secondary—even inferior—to open eyes. To teach a person to draw, with strokes of a pencil or with words, was to place a golden key in their hands—they would never look at the world around them the same way again. The old indifference which is the curse of familiarity would give way before the staggering particularity of nature and design. And in the effort to produce a creative response, howsoever imperfect, the beauty could be owned in a way that even physical possession could not guarantee.

My contract on the hill was drawn up in the form of a poem. Candidly, I don’t know the first thing about writing poetry; it would be generous to call all previous attempts awkward. But when I saw that hill, when I knew I must have it, I knew with equal conviction that the payment had to be made in verse. It was so far beyond my powers that the added humility of ineptitude seemed appropriate. For three hours I sat there in the sun, a blue English sky above and the beloved, satiny English grass beneath, and waited upon that work. I was aware of every flick of a bird’s wing in the hedges behind me, and the deep, concentrated indigo of the bloom-frosted sloes tangled thick within the branches. A cockerel saluted the world from some unseen farmyard far below and the uniquely pastoral, slightly ovine scent of the countryside rose up to greet me like a friend. I watched the shadow of a tree travel over the velvet surface of a mounded hill to the south and saw the wood doves fling themselves skyward with a bustle of feathers and matronly complaint. And when, at length, I collected my things and started back down towards our cottage and my tea, I could almost hear my own heart pounding in my chest, I felt so alive.

I had come to inquire and I was leaving in possession.

But ownership is not all, of course, even in this imaginative sense—there is a much deeper magic at play for the child of God. For the true apprehension of beauty, like faith itself, is an exercise in laying claim to what is already ours. There is a low door in the garden wall, and it opens on an inheritance: this is my Father’s world, and He has given it to me. All of the beauty in this astonishing universe of ours has already been lavished by a self-giving Creator. Wakefulness and effort give forth upon our birthright; seeing becomes receiving. Of this sublimity the Restoration-era minister Thomas Traherne waxes exuberant in his masterpiece of meditation, Centuries: “Your enjoyment of the world is never right,” he says, “till you so esteem it, that everything in it is more your treasure than a King’s exchequer full of Gold and Silver…till the Sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens and crowned with the stars: and perceive yourself to be the sole heir of the whole world, and more than so, because men are in it who are every one sole heirs as well as you.”

In short, if we find ourselves wandering through this beautiful world of ours with ink-stained fingers and dreamy eyes and a slightly lopsided ivy crown, gazing about like we own the place, it’s because we do.

originally published on The Rabbit Room, February 2012

I hadn’t even gotten her home from the airport before we were scheming about changing her return ticket.

Five days just wasn’t long enough—not nearly sufficient to celebrate fifteen years of friendship or to reclaim the winding span of months since we’d parted.

The last time I had seen her was in a dim Oxford hallway, saying goodnight and goodbye after a magical long weekend amid the cloisters and choir-haunted chapels. There had been tea at the Old Parsonage, a stiffly formal affair in which she had been undaunted and Continental enough to require an extra helping of clotted cream for our scones—a bit of brazenness for which I blessed her with all my soul—and a lingering farewell dinner at The Trout, wherein we had laughed so hard together that my husband had snapped a picture of the two of us in tears. I had dragged her to the tip-top steeple of St. Mary the Virgin, to give her one of the best views in all the world, and we had wandered over the grounds of Lewis’ Magdalen and picked up glossy-skinned chestnuts, or marron, as she called them, to remember a golden day by.

It had been a time out of time for both of us, a curious juxtaposition of old days and new, and when we finally parted ways—Philip and I back to the States and she bound for the Chunnel and Paris and husband and bebes—I had absolutely no idea when I would see her again. I only knew that God would surprise me, as He has so many countless times before, and that it would be a gift. As always.

And so, here we were, two and-a-half years later, with five days before us which we both knew would pass like a flash, and understanding husbands on both sides urging a change of plans. (We tried—every angle we could think of. But it just wasn’t possible on such short notice. And so the five days grew all the more precious, grew to a sweet burden of golden moments which I endeavored to glean for all they were worth, even as they flew.)

I wanted to talk her ear off, and hear every detail of the intervening years—the phone is just so woefully inadequate. But I also wanted to be quiet with her. She is that kind of friend, one with whom silence is natural and always has been. I wanted to give her a breath of peace from the city’s roar and fret, and send her home to her beloved ones rested and maybe a little spoiled. It made me happy to see her there in my sunroom, knitting quietly on the windowseat—like the calm and cherished presence of a sister.

I can hardly remember a time when it was otherwise. We made a triumvirate in the old days—she, my sister and I—an immediate and cherished kinship of soul, alternately solemn and silly as the mood seized us. Though technically living with another family across town, she occupied the extra twin bed in my room as often as not, and became so much a part of our family that my brother teased her with the same merciless candor he affectionately doled out to my sister and me. She entered into our interests and our joys with an enthusiasm not only commendable, but downright endearing. A Frenchwoman to the bone, and yet she loved the States with an open heart—an honest stance she managed to effect without losing an iota of her French-ness.

She opened new worlds to me, while assimilating so easily into mine. She taught me how to throw a dinner party, and how to make the perfect crêpe. She instructed me in the subtle art of buying perfume and, more importantly, how to wear it. She introduced me to champagne, though she doesn’t care for it herself, and she brought Nutella into my life, and tea from Mariage Freres. She was as happy sketching with my sister as messing about with me in the kitchen, and she was game for any scheme we cooked up with our friends, from moonlight croquet matches to Scottish Country Dancing to Jane Austen parties in full period dress.

She read Shakespeare aloud with my family, taking multiple roles when necessary, and we laughed at her literally talking to herself in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. But it was from Macbeth that we snatched a name for our threesome, in a moment of hilarity I think even the Bard would have smiled upon: The Weird Sisters, or, Les Sœurs Bizarres, as we liked to call ourselves.

There were whole nights we stayed up well into the wee sma’s, talking or messing with our hair or being ridiculous. But there were just as many—and these I remember the most—where we sat clenching hands and praying for one another in broken voices. I cherish this most about her, in a long friendship of bright-threaded goodness, that she has never shied from my darkness or my pain. She came into my life at a critical pass, and my life will never be the same as a result. That is the unknowing influence of a true friend. They simply are, and God breathes love through them in ways even they cannot imagine.

I always knew that she would marry an American. It seemed the most logical way for God to keep her close and in our lives. I seriously did not believe in her return to France all those years ago, even up until those last moments at the airport. It was so unthinkable I had convinced myself that God just simply would not let it happen. And when it did, I waited—a trifle audaciously, I’m afraid—for the miracle I knew would surely come.

There have been so many visits over the years. She was here for my last Christmas at home and barely missed my engagement to Philip by a couple of days (a fact for which I fear she has yet to forgive him). She traveled to the States for both my wedding and my sister’s. Philip and I traveled to Paris for hers. She did marry an American in the end, a good and godly man. And God planted them in France on a kingdom commission. How plainly we see our lives spread out before us at twenty-four; how clear and straightforward everything seems, when contrasted with the increasing complexity of time. There are so many dips and twists down in the valleys which we cannot see or imagine from those exalted heights of youth. Things seldom pan out just as we expect them to: friends move away or are called Home; opportunities arise for which we’d never dreamed, and seasons, sweet as they are, must give way and change.

It’s just such a strong comfort to know that, amid a shifting landscape of light and shadow, some things will never change.

This past visit was so dear, the mercy gift I’ve characteristically come to expect from a loving Father. I was able to chat online with her beautiful children and hear her describe to them the wonders of my peacocks in full, feathered glory. We dined on coquilles Saint-Jacques at a candlelit table on the porch and carried a formidable picnic to the farm. We ambled around the Square of the town where I grew up—and where we had so many misadventures back in the day—and we reminisced over midnight bowls of soup. She may have hidden behind me when I introduced her to my goats, but she understands and respects my love for them. And she spoke patient French with me, repeating things slowly when her words came out in a bewilderment of lovely incomprehensibility, and gently correcting my grammar and pronunciation when necessary. I blush to think of the times my sister and I howled with laughter over the slightest misstep she made with English—she who speaks it more beautifully and fluently than many Americans!—and the bywords we made of her adorable little sayings. What a good sport she’s been, and with what grace she has always accepted the affection of our humor at her expense! She could very easily have laughed right back at me this past visit, and countless times. But instead she praised my progress with her redoubtable language—Philip and I call it ‘tongues of angels’—and filled my head (and my mouth) with tricks and tips and charming idioms I’ve been rehearsing ever since.

And on the last night, we prayed for each other, clenching hands. I didn’t know whether to be more moved at the sorrow of yet another parting, or touched with inexpressible joy at the goodness of God in our lives. How His glories gleam out amid the folds of the hills. I never could have imagined it at twenty-four.

Je t’aime, mon ami. Vous êtes si chers à mon cœur.

Oh, friends, the Spring Collection is up over at Olive & Jane! These talented milliners have been busy in the atelier and the results are simply stunning. Do go and feast your eyes on the lovely new hats and fascinators in the shop, including the launch of a precious line for little girls.

The Strawberries and Cream Lookbook is so breathtakingly delightful you’ll want to get lost in it. Just make sure your volume is turned up! (And there’s an added bonus: the featuring of a collection of bowties for men and little boys in gorgeous Liberty prints, handmade by the talented Spare Time Artisan.)

So treat yourself to a good dose of the beautiful. The joy and enthusiasm of these sister-artists are sure to spill over into your day!

p.s. in celebration of the new collection, and just in time for Easter, Olive & Jane are hosting another hat giveaway. You can find out more about it on their blog.

But friendship is precious, not only in the shade, but in the sunshine of life, and thanks to a benevolent arrangement the greater part of life is sunshine. ~Thomas Jefferson

We spent yesterday in company with a clutch of the dearest folks in the world, working together on a project for our beloved friends’ new millinery shop, Olive and Jane.

From the first morning hours it was a day of filtered spring sunlight and pale pretty dresses. Sherbet-hued balloons and hobnail vases and a pastel rainbow of antique glass compotes. Vintage aprons to spare, and perhaps an appearance of a certain Silver Girl, of whom we’re all most fond.

There was beauty everywhere I turned my eyes: from the small army of children romping and rolling in the grass in party frocks and wee-sized bowties, to the exquisite and exclusive new creations my friends had hand-crafted (oh, my heavenly days, I cannot wait for you to see them!), to the faces of my friends themselves—most beautiful of all to my grateful gaze.

When the shadows grew long-fingered and the late sunlight came in a tide of gold, we all flopped, sunburned and exhausted, into sling-backed chairs and toasted a day’s work with a celebratory glass of wine. To hear the laughter pealing out from our small circle, the shrieks of mirth over misadventures both past and present, one might be seriously tempted to imagine that the company assembled had never known a moment’s sadness or perplexity. It even struck me as I sat there in the midst of it all, feeding the merry banter with absurdities and ‘do-you-remembers’, how far the sunny moment seemed from even the hint of shadow.

But the reality is—I acknowledged it with a stab of grateful joy—that it’s the shadows themselves that have made such a fellowship possible. These women have walked with me through some of the darkest passes of my life. They have told me the truth when my soul was parched for it—they have not only spoken God’s love to me, they have lived it in the flesh.

They are the ones I call when I have good news. But I also call them when sorrow is crushing and when the burden of the day is too heavy to be carried alone. Beyond all that, they love me so well (heaven knows why!) that they are not afraid to press through my insecure hedges of “I’m fine” with a persistent, “No. Tell me how you really are.”

They have celebrated my joys as if they were their own, and they have wrestled in prayer for me to the point of tears. We have sung together at happy times, like Christmas and our own little made-up holidays, and at tender ones, like my grandmother’s funeral. We have dragged each other into some ridiculous scrapes, mostly involving vintage clothing of some description, and we have helped each other out of jams, often in the form of major house renovations gone haywire.

The underside of this bright-winged happiness is a dun-colored vulnerability and trust, seemingly prosaic, but utterly requisite for real friendship. I was talking to someone the other day who likened a particular burden in life to the job of carrying a piano.

“It’s hard enough for five or six,” he said, “but it’s impossible with only one or two.”

My eyes filled with tears at the thought, because I knew with the witness of the past and the confidence of the present, that if there are any pianos to be carried in my future, literal or figurative, these friends of mine will be at my side.

And even in the midst of pain or toil, they’ll have me laughing.