Of rivers and decency and order
Recently I had the chance to sit on my parents’ land on the Cartecay River in Gilmer County. I leaned back against a natural bench of gray, lichen-covered stone against which the shallower water bounced in tiny waves. I looked across the river to the small rapids that form over a stair-step rock formation that marks the fall of elevation that takes the Cartecay toward the larger Coosawattee. The water level was perfect. When the river is much lower, it doesn’t flow as smoothly, and if it’s any higher, the rapids sort of lose their definition and just become big swells.
In all my years playing on her banks, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the Cartecay look prettier. The water had an evergreen hue in places punctuated by golden glints of sunlight, and over the rapids, whitewater splashed back on itself in foamy bubbles. The appearance put me in mind of an oldfashioned jello tower trimmed in frothy, whipped cream. The colors, the sparkling sunlight, the encompassing, dull roar of the rapids … they spoke to the timelessness of God’s natural creation.
I stared into the swirling water, and I knew that the peace of this moment and the certainty that no one would remove me that day from the place where the most primordial parts of my heart and mind live, was a privilege so many people do not share. And I said a short, simple prayer that the people who truly value accord and harmony today may know when and how to peacefully and lawfully resist tyranny in all its forms, whether it’s occurring at home or across the world from them.
Discernment can be an elusive thing in the face of a threat to one’s well-being and that of one’s family members. And I’d bet my bottom dollar that’s what perpetrators of chaos, confusion and violence count on. Perhaps those are the only mechanisms they know, or maybe they just enjoy seeing the effects of such efforts. Perhaps there’s more of a tendency to swing toward that darkness that lives in all of us in order to accomplish certain objectives that seem only to benefit one or a few rather than the larger body of humanity.
It’s a tough thing for most of us to figure, but for me, getting caught up in the whys doesn’t seem productive. I’ve indulged in that type of reflection quite a bit in my time, but the conclusion I’ve come to is that trying to understand an ongoing and unrepentant capitulation to these tendencies is important, but it shouldn’t become so front-and-center that it hampers us from doing what we can — peacefully and within the bounds of the law — to preserve decency and order. It’s taken me 39 years to land on that conclusion, so I can only imagine what members of older generations might know about it.
And what can we do if it seems our hands are tied? Quite a lot, I think. Speaking of older generations, if you’ve ever read “The Hiding Place” by Corrie ten Boom, you’ll know what I mean when I speak of the author’s ability to see fleas as blessings. Maybe it’s that stubborn resilience that represents the light that allows us to take small, consistent, meaningful actions in situations that may seem impossible to overcome.
But what do I know? Maybe I’m just a small-town reporter yammering on about a river in rural North Georgia running through land I don’t even own. And maybe the Cartecay was just flowing on to other destinations that day, chattering to herself as she always does, or maybe she carried a message in her life-giving waters.