"Live Oaks and Spanish Moss"

 

If these dual personalities could talk, I’m sure the Spanish moss hanging low enough to whisper in our ear, would tell us the stories of a painful past. They would whisper about the trail of tears suffered by Native Americans. Land acquired by being taken, colonized, rezoned, but Live Oaks and Spanish Moss are never shaken. They would whisper tales about how the Spanish Moss does not grow on oak trees where slaves were hung. They would solve the case of a slain Commissioner, Tom Sublett. The Live Oak mantled by the swaying Spanish Moss would speak of a future that is brighter than we could ever imagine. It is a future where social ills become a healed memory of the past and prosperity runs like the same river that nurtures its roots. In a peaceful overshadowing, they beckon us to meet them for a time of significant reflection.

As I stand and reflect, a few questions come to mind. Why am I on the coast of South Georgia walking adventurously through the forest with a group of people I don't even know? I guess that was the only way to discover that you are enigmatic but regal, peculiar yet alluring, strange but beautiful. Your destination near moist air and fertile ground from St. Simons Island to Savannah, GA. to Tallahassee, FL. make you appear to be like a tree planted by rivers of water. As my best friend says, you are “mysteriously beautiful.”