Honeyoe

Strawberries possess an uncanny resemblance to the human heart—and not just in anatomic shape. Each grows in an organic mess. Once ripened and collected, you perform a small surgery, slicing off its top. Sanguine liquid oozes. The berry drops into a cold, metal bowl.

I weeded his strawberry rows for hours in the Virginia summer because there is nothing else to do while you wait for stitches and a body split in two to heal. And the delicate berries were bruised, defenseless against the harsh, humid air. Some slowly gave way to rot.

We both decided to worry about the strawberries and not looming medical concerns. We spoke earnestly about which berries were sweetest. (The Honeyoe seemed the best, not too sweet, perfectly tart. While we had bowls and bowls of Jewel strawberries, they almost tasted too sweet.) Dwindling energy meant little time spent in the garden. Even so, it was the first year the rows produced; and weeds threatened to choke them all. The Brunswick and Kent rows were struggling. How to stay healthy?

Knees in the crunching dirt, I returned to these tiny bites of vanitas to grapple with my anxiety. First with my own hands in the dirt, those humbling words haunting me: “ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” Then in my studio with photographs as I elongate my time in the strawberry rows. A singular moment then continuously exists—instead of passing on. Here vanitas captures a struggle for life, rather than a surrender to weeds and rot.