We have been feasting a lot on strawberries this year, rich and juicy fare. The picture, taken by my granddaughter Stina on her mother's camera, celebrates that richness, inviting one to take a bite of some cut up morsels.
Don't let the richness and juiciness of them fool you into believing they just descended from heaven. The Swedes have captured their essence in naming them jordgubber, "old men of the earth." No earth, no aging of plant in the soil, no waiting for the fruit to appear and there are no strawberries. The same can be said for all fruit--blueberries, peaches, pears, tomatoes, or whatever.
There are parallels here to all of life. In what Elton Trueblood once called our "cut flower culture," we are forever being tempted to forget that. "Just give me the fruit," many say. "Forget the soil, the rich nutrients and time frames in nature that are behind its appearing. Strawberries can be had without all that. We know. We bought some this morning."
It's like saying, forget history and the cycles of life that have worked over time to produce life in all its forms. Can anyone have a baby without a time of pregnancy? No thing and no one, John Donne reminds us, "is an island entire of itself." Though everyone "is somewhere," as my mother used to say, they are never there wholly apart from all that brought them there.
The lesson is clear. To forget your own history and pay no attention to nature's is to lose the true richness of life. Sugar and cream may be used to add taste to strawberries--as nice clothes and other accoutements to adorn our bodies--but by themselves they have little to contribute. The real essence of stawberries lies in their being jordgubber. So does ours! We are of the earth, earthy. As graveside commttals keep reminding us: from dust you have come and to dust you shall return.
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