Did you know camellias grow on trees? Daughter Number Three identified a glossy-leafed tree with big pink blossoms as a camellia when Daughter Number Three and I asked her about it. She’d planted it herself. Once we knew what to look for, we saw camellias everywhere we went in North Carolina. The same was true of fringe flower bushes. We’d learned the previous year that wisteria in that part of the country is an invasive. The vines drape themselves over trees in such quantity that they’re visible from the air. There was snow in the ground in the places D#1 and I had left behind, but it was definitely spring in North Carolina.
While we were there, we met D#3’s first grandchild, a handsome fellow of eight months. He’s at a stage of babyhood where you can see the progress of his coordination and learning, the strengthening of his muscles, while you watch. He’s pulling himself to a standing position now, using furniture or doting relations as props. My favorite of his maneuvers is how he achieves a standing position when seated on someone’s lap: he pushes off, abdomen first. It’s a hundred percent effective.
He’s remarkably good natured, and his mom and dad are wonderful, patient parents. He’s a happy, healthy baby and a wonder to behold. I’ve never seen a baby so secure in being loved.
His Uncle Jervis is no slouch, either. Both daughters and I went on a road trip to Atlanta, Georgia, for his concert there, the second-to-last stop on his latest tour. Jervis is a singer- songwriter of what his mom describes as indie-Christian music. The concert was sold out, but Jervis told us not to worry; he would put us on the list. Turns out it’s fun to be on the list, with benefits including having security see us to our car after at the end of the evening.
Jervis travels with an opener and a band, these days. The performance has lights that flash and turn colors with the music. His audience is enrapt and knows his lyrics, singing along when invited to do so. Our grandson has developed charisma since we last laid eyes on him. When he walks into a room, whether concert venue or motel lobby, people notice.
He told us the last concert of the tour, in Nashville, is also sold out. He’s chuffed about that because it is, apparently, hard to sell out a venue there. He says there’s so much music there, available for free, that to have six hundred people buy tickets and go out to a concert is a big deal.
One aspect of Jervis’s concerts is unlike any concerts D#1 and I had ever attended. There are scarcely any seats. The audience stands for the entire performance. I asked D#3 about this, and she said Jervis had, in fact, given a concert in a place that had seats, and that people had ignored them and stood the whole time anyway. The fellas did scare up folding chairs from backstage for us, but sitting in them meant we mostly couldn’t see the stage. I sat the whole time, but the girls ended up standing and, eventually, making their way much closer to the stage. We had a lot of fun and, from what we could tell, the performers did, too. I’m so glad we went.
The girls and I and D#3’s husband went on a couple of terrific walks on trails through the woods and along rivers. One was part of the Carolina Thread Trail, a three-hundred-mile, fifteen-county network of trails. The part we walked took us over the state line to South Carolina. Right on the state line, there is a suspension bridge for pedestrians, the sort of bridge you see in movies.
If you have the bridge to yourself and walk intentionally down the center as you cross, there’s not much to the experience. Another person setting foot on the bridge with you, however, sets up new resonances. More people change them again, and amplify them. Suddenly the bridge you’d been congratulating yourself on traversing with some dignity starts to roll and pitch and yaw, and you grab for the support cables on either side.
The suspension bridge for pedestrians in Falls Park, in Greenville, South Carolina, was another experience altogether. It’s curvilinear and graceful, with supports that are angled, rather than vertical. The park is extraordinary, gorgeously designed and fragrant with blossom.
Spending time with family, four generations together, was, of course, the best part of the trip. The memories warm D#1 and I as we return to our homes, where it’s still winter.
5 April 2024