Something Beyond

A few months ago, I was selling a home in Grant Park that contained a ton of books that the seller was going to convey with the home. I asked her if I could buy just one book from her before she did that. It was this dark green, old-looking hardback that said "Burns" on the spine that I saw way up on the top shelf.

On the day of closing, I went by with a ladder to retrieve my book. After I climbed up & pulled it off the shelf, I opened it for the first time to see what I'd bought for myself. It appeared to be a collection of Robert Burns' poetry. I could't find the actual publish date, but a few pages in, I did see a preface written by the editor dated May 7, 1856. And just before that page, I noticed an inscription at the top that appeared to read, "To Leo. W. Stewart from Walker & Barnes 1879."

Now that I had it in my hands, I didn't really know what drew me to it in the first place. I guess I just liked the beautiful Art Nouveau embossing on the spine, which I now realized carried around gorgeously to the front and back covers. I figured at the time I first saw it, if I ended up not really wanting it once I'd pulled it down, at least I could donate it to the Robert Burns Society on Alloway Street around the corner.

When I got home with it, the first thing I did was look up the value. Every site I perused had these things stacked up and hanging around, unsold, all over the place. They were a dime a dozen. I guessed Robert Burns was one of the most prolifically published poets of the late nineteenth century. That being the case, I figured it might not even be that valuable to the Society so I nixed the idea of donating it to them. I thought, well, I've just bought myself a beautiful old book, that's all. I got up from the computer, picked up the book and walked into my living room to put it on the shelf.

When I reached up to put it there, I missed the shelf like the clutz that I am and it hit the floor, splaying open. I thought, oh no Rob, this is why we can't have nice things. I picked it up. It wasn't damaged, thank goodness, but what appeared to be a book mark had fallen out.

I picked that up and saw that it was actually an old business card. The name on the card said "Geo. W. Stewart." Oh -- ok, so the person that Walker & Barnes gave this book to is not Leo, it's George. I gathered from the information on the business card that he and someone named J J McMillan were publishers at the Delta Publishing Company in Visalia located in Tulare County, California. I had no idea what that was, so I looked them up.

Y'all. When I say I went down a rabbit hole, I mean I went down a full 1,000-foot deep underground catacomb of them, and I didn't come up for air for hours. I literally started reading about this guy at 6pm and didn't close my computer and go to bed until 2 in the morning.

Turns out, George William Stewart got a bit passionate as a 21-year-old, small-town-California journalist about the ongoing, unmitigated destruction of the big trees in and around the San Joaquin Valley. He and another buddy, Frank Walker (I'm guessing the "Walker" who wrote the inscription in the book) started doing the pulling of strings and the political dancing to get done what had to be done. Finally, in 1890, Stewart and his community reaped the reward of nearly two decades of collective work when in the late summer that year, the Sequoia National Park bill passed both houses of Congress and was signed by President Benjamin Harrison on September 25.

This act created America's second national park (the first was Yellowstone in 1872), which initiated the formation of a new system -- the National Park Service -- that now contains almost 400 separate units. According to tularecountytreasures.org, "It is hard to overestimate the significance of what Stewart and his Tulare County friends accomplished in 1890. Locally, they saved what we now know to be the largest trees on earth. Beyond that, they also established a pattern for national systems of preserved lands – a model that continues to expand across the planet even in the 21st century."

And here I sit with a random book in my hand owned by this man, given to him by his stalwart friends and fellow champions in that cause.

Today, I did finally figure out who the "Barnes" was. He was Washington Westley Barnes, owner and publisher of the Visalia Delta at the time Stewart worked there. Walker and Barnes likely gave the book to Stewart as a gift upon his being promoted to city editor, just two years after he started working for the paper. Around the same time he received this gift, George addressed the destruction in the mountains east of Visalia in a Delta editorial for the very first time, where he called for a state law to prohibit the cutting of giant sequoias. And the rest is history.

But I just wondered -- what was the significance of a book of poetry by Robert Burns in all this, if anything? Did Stewart express some love of poetry by Burns during his early employ at the paper?

On the back of the business card, I can see a list of numbered passages in the book that he made note of. Why were those important to him? Is there anything in the passages he marked that inspired his writings or, early on, ignited his life's passion?

I read some of them and I didn't really get a direct connection, until I read the very last one he noted, page 289, where in the middle of that page is a short yet profound poem that reads as follows...

𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐿𝑎𝑧𝑦 𝑀𝑖𝑠𝑡

𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑙𝑎𝑧𝑦 𝑚𝑖𝑠𝑡 ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑠 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑟𝑜𝑤 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑙, 𝐶𝑜𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑘 𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑟𝑖𝑙𝑙; 𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑢𝑖𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑠, 𝑙𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑠𝑜 𝑠𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡𝑙𝑦, 𝑎𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑎𝑟! 𝐴𝑠 𝐴𝑢𝑡𝑢𝑚𝑛 𝑡𝑜 𝑊𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑔𝑛𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑎𝑙𝑒 𝑦𝑒𝑎𝑟.

𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑡𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑓𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠, 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑜𝑤𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑏𝑟𝑜𝑤𝑛, 𝐴𝑛𝑑 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑔𝑎𝑦 𝑓𝑜𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑢𝑚𝑚𝑒𝑟 𝑖𝑠 𝑓𝑙𝑜𝑤𝑛: 𝐴𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑤𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟, 𝑎𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑚𝑢𝑠𝑒, 𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑞𝑢𝑖𝑐𝑘 𝑇𝑖𝑚𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑓𝑙𝑦𝑖𝑛𝑔, ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑘𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝐹𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑝𝑢𝑟𝑠𝑢𝑒𝑠!

𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝐼 𝑙𝑖𝑣'𝑑, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑚𝑢𝑐ℎ 𝑙𝑖𝑣'𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑣𝑎𝑖𝑛! 𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑒'𝑠 𝑠𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑦 𝑠𝑝𝑎𝑛 𝑚𝑎𝑦 𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑎𝑖𝑛! 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑎𝑠𝑝𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑠, 𝑜𝑙𝑑 𝑇𝑖𝑚𝑒, 𝑖𝑛 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑔𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑠, ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑛! 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑡𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑐𝑟𝑢𝑒𝑙 𝐹𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑦 𝑏𝑜𝑠𝑜𝑚 ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑛!

𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑓𝑜𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑠ℎ, 𝑜𝑟 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑠𝑒, 𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑠𝑢𝑚𝑚𝑖𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛'𝑑! 𝐴𝑛𝑑 𝑑𝑜𝑤𝑛𝑤𝑎𝑟𝑑, ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑤𝑒𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑛'𝑑, ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑘𝑒𝑛'𝑑, ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑝𝑎𝑖𝑛'𝑑! 𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑒'𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑡ℎ ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑖𝑡 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑔𝑖𝑣𝑒, 𝐹𝑜𝑟 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑏𝑒𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑝𝑜𝑜𝑟 𝑚𝑎𝑛 𝑠𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝑚𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑙𝑖𝑣𝑒.

I read the last two lines again -- This life's not worth having with all it can give, for something beyond it poor man sure must live -- and now I get it.

At some point in our lives, we're all struck with that age-old question, "What the hell am I doing here?" And everyone reading this right now knows how hard it is to really, REALLY answer that question.

But when we do answer it -- however slowly over the years or however quickly in a moment of profound clarity -- when we realize that our passion for whatever we decide to pour our blood, sweat and tears into will be something that will outlive us for generations to come, and at the same time when we accept the fact that fate will only give us a small amount of time here on earth to set that thing in motion -- starting a foundation, raising our children, passing a law, saving a forest, whatever it may be -- that's when we really realize, at last, that our life is, in fact, worth living. When you know you're going to make a difference in the lives of the people you care about — and exponentially more in the future — it doesn't matter that you won't get to see it to the end. Setting it in motion is the biggest thrill of all.

We all want our lives to mean something. And WE want to mean something. I can imagine this young man with this fire in his heart, wanting to make a difference by helping to protect and preserve something for generations to come. I can imagine him reading this passage. The words sinking in and a light going off in his head. He puts the book down, he gathers his troops, then he puts in the work for next two decades. One hundred and thirty-two years later, here we are, on this earth, surely reaping the reward of that "something beyond" for which he lived.

I'm still not sure why, out of all the hundreds and hundreds of books on those shelves, this one chose me. But I'm glad it did.

.......

References:

https://www.tularecountytreasures.org/sequoia-national...

https://www.nps.gov/.../online.../dilsaver-tweed/chap4.htm