ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, May 26, 1996 TAG: 9605240018
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: THE BACK PEW
SOURCE: CODY LOWE
"Smell that," I said to my 12-year-old, LeeEllen.
"Ummm, honeysuckle," she said with a smile, closing her eyes and soaking up the fragrance.
Getting a whiff of one of spring's most distinctive odors isn't so unusual, maybe, but I was struck at how long it lasted as we zipped up U.S. 220 at 55 mph.
That smell stuck with us, a third passenger, for more than a mile.
With the heat we've suffered through lately, the car tends to stay closed up with the air conditioning on. That effectively closes out most of the outside atmosphere.
It's a pity that's necessary when it means forgoing an intoxicating draft of the season.
That smell was a potent reminder of the beauty that is around us, and, for many religious folks, further evidence of the hand of God at work in creation.
This is not where I'm going to enter the creationism-evolution debate, but is, rather, a recognition that even many who buy into the principles of evolution see the hand of a Creator "in the beginning."
While the odor of a honeysuckle plant may serve natural or evolutionary functions, its purpose for us is merely pleasure. We like to smell it.
The old, worn cliche advises us to "stop and smell the roses."
Well, for me, this year it was honeysuckle.
I realized later my appreciative reaction may seem a bit ludicrous to someone who has seen me go after a honeysuckle plant in the garden. I don't want a sprig of the stuff growing in my yard. It takes over, ruins a garden, covers anything in its path almost as relentlessly as kudzu.
I remember being shocked the first time I saw honeysuckle plants for sale at a nursery. I couldn't believe people would pay perfectly good, presumably hard-earned cash for a weed.
But they do. And the only obvious reason is for that brief spring "fix" of honeysuckle perfume that is so potent and unforgettable.
What the old "stop-and-smell" cliche fails to recognize is that it really doesn't take an exotic or rare or otherwise "precious" object of nature - such as a rose - to lead us to an appreciation of the natural world.
Plain old honeysuckle, which I rank pretty near the bottom of the charm scale among plants, can be the ticket to a renewed experience of the glory around us. And it can remind us of the importance of taking time to transform a few minutes of the ordinary into something extraordinary.
That drive only happened a few days ago, but at this moment I can't for the life of me remember why LeeEllen and I were in the car, headed home from Roanoke.
The important event of that day was not whatever errand we were running, or whatever chore we completed when we got home. It was a moment of shared joy over a scent in the air.
Our religions often tell the story of God in terms of miracles in which the laws of nature are suspended or violated or superseded - the parting of the Red Sea, surviving a stint in a fiery furnace, turning water into wine.
But most of us usually see signs of God in the more ordinary manifestations of nature.
I tend to think the Song of Solomon was included in the Bible because it is so uninhibitedly a celebration of our senses. "My beloved is to me a bag of myrrh.'' ... ``His fruit was sweet to my taste."
The book's inclusion actually was an embarrassment to some early Christian leaders because of that unabashed sensuality, but most modern Christians have gotten over that and come to appreciate - as Judaism always has - the book's revelry in the senses.
Likewise, a number of the Psalms celebrate the natural world around us - the beauty of mountains, skies, rivers and trees.
I'm not inclined to worship nature, as has become popular again in some circles. But it's nice to have this season each year to remind us to celebrate the natural world.
And what a deal it is to have God's air freshener blow right through the windows of my car.
LENGTH: Medium: 77 linesby CNB