Porgy & Bess: Summertime

“And the livin’ is easy.”

Or maybe it’s not.

Trials and troubles are not seasonal.

The Deep South Holds Deep Truths

For my birthday in December, my husband took me to Charleston, SC––a place I’d longed to visit. In December, the fish are not jumping and the cotton is not high.

Still, I wanted to see Charleston because I love history. Even though I know “history” gets all gussied up, made to look like Disneyland, there are remnants from history that help us see ourselves in a bigger picture. A picture without shopping malls and cell phones and the weight of the world staring back at us from TV.

So happy to have stumbled on The South Carolina Historical Society Museum that featured Porgy and Bess, (reminder of a movie I remember from childhood). I will avoid the controversy of who and what took the film out of circulation and why you and I cannot watch the 1959 movie today, despite its famous director and actors.

More history editing.

Porgy and Bess is based on DuBose Heyward’s novel, PORGY, and the play he and his wife Dorothy adapted. Du Bose Heyward was born in Charleston in 1885. After reading Heyward’s book, George and Ira Gershwin went to Charleston, collaborated with Heyward, and created America’s first opera.

Years ago, I saw the stage production in Dallas. Music and lyrics, unforgettable. The lullaby, “Summertime” is part of the Overture, which is available on iTunes––the original Broadway cast recording.

A few pictures I took in the Charleston museum

“Summertime,” lilting and longing, soothing words sung from mother to baby, the lyrics convey hope for a better future. Those words refreshed my weary soul one hot, sultry summer in East Texas.

I Got Plenty of Nuttin’

All of us will have plenty of “nuttin”––nothing––if we forget history, (our own history included); expunge what we do not like, rewrite chapters, or try to pretend things that happened didn't happen.

Art for art’s sake (art gratia artis), artists make artifacts from the bits and pieces of real life. These artifacts become something to help us relate as human beings.

Books, plays, music––stories––serve as reminders and warnings, too.

Our troubles and our trials differ. Yet humanity is more than skin deep. We can learn from the lives and experiences––and mistakes––of others.

Imagination and empathy and compassion create pathways for understanding. And seeing someone (even a fictional character) display hope in dire circumstances, find love and fleeting happiness where least expected, these stories carry us a little further down the road we each must travel, despite the troubles we face today.

Livin’ ain’t easy.

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

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