Joy Unfinished

This is a draft of a blog I began writing back in August of 2010.  The subject of this blog, "joy," stunned me back then and I have done much soul-searching concerning its lack in my life and the lives of those around me. I did not finish this blog because I was not finished exploring the topic of joy. So I give you this rough draft, in basically the unfinished form it was left in and wonder how you would fill in the gaps. I have come to my own conclusions and that has been a joy in itself.  

Michala, Mary Grace, and I recently visited my childhood home of Pawleys Island, SC.  While we stuffed ourselves on ribs and boiled peanuts, our sense of awe was also filled with the breath-taking beauty of the South Carolina lowcountry.  Some folks think us South Carolinians are arrogant (and they are probably right) but it is hard not to have a pride of life living in a place with such a sense of mystique.  Located a few miles north of Pawleys is an old plantation that has been reinvented as an enormous sculpture garden called Brookgreen Gardens.  Leaving Mary Grace with her Papa Johnny, Michala and I set out to continue our gluttonous consumption of beauty, and we were not disappointed. Brookgreen is larger than life, spanning 9,000 acres and several miles of coast upon the Waccamaw River.  Michala and I forgot about the 90 plus degree weather coupled with an almost surreal level of humidity as we walked beneath the limbs of 300 year-old, moss draped live oak trees.  We felt like kids again in this wonderful place, as if we had walked through a wardrobe to get to this Narnia.  Yet the one thing that most struck me, seered my soul even, was the sculpture entitled "Frog Baby" (pictured above).  In this artist's depiction of young boy's reaction after he has snared two frogs, the frog baby gazes heavenward with a smile that leaves the viewer both inwardly renewed and yet haunted to the core.  Most of the people in our group produced similar outward reation, that of laughter mixed with a hint of scoff.  Yet the boy's face has not failed to leave me alone in the three weeks since we met.  In fact it is more of a haunting than anything, the way it stays with me.  I have been left to ponder why would this expression of sheer joy be haunting? Inside each of us is alonging for true joy, but the pains of this life often choke to death any eruption of joy in our lives.

I saw that same face agian this morning upon my daughter.  As we were preparring for church this morning, I took it upon my self to dance with Mary Grace. I dipped and dunked as she held on to me, curious as to what brough on such silliness and then I spun her around.  At first her face only knew shock, but that was quickly wiped away by joy, leaving me looking into the smile of the frog baby.