Musings on Beauty: Part I

Someone called me an anti-authoritarian yesterday because I said I didn't like the "Jesus loves me" song on account of the lyric "cause the Bible tells me so." It's just a minor thing, but it's under my skin and I don't have plans of pulling it out. I just feel like it sets a precedent for proof-texting, but I am aware of my (possibly) blowing it out of proportion. For the record, I am actually an idealistic meritocrat, but stoop to democracy for the same reasons as Lewis - "because I believe in the fall of man."

All that said, I'm not upset, and it is difficult to be upset when I am away in the Valley. My heart sighs watching the birds fly over the fields and long stretches of water... cute little houses and tall steeples, framed by autumn colours right now, no less. A leaf blows by and somehow I am enchanted. A little spider is spinning a web in the window before me, and I wish I never had to leave. I have never expressed this because it is not something that regularly goes through my mind, but I get what is known as "cuteness aggression" and although it's not entirely a one-to-one equivalent, the idea of watching seasons pass here from a porch nearly drives me mad.  

And so, today I am simultaneously musing about these sorts of alluring things...Pinnacles of beauty, belonging, "perfection;" Plato's forma, in the most basic sense. Nowadays so much is said to be subjective, I think it can be easy to forget that our world is full of exquisite beauty of a natural kind, and that the kind either manifested through art and culture, grown from our imaginations, give us life and trajectory that we forget when we focus on "normalizing" or even rewarding mediocrity. Of course I understand subjective beauty, too, but it seems a different kind of beast. For instance, while I might still describe the "perfect" form of a man or woman through the lens of an ideal that is hardly reached, the kind of beauty that comes from emotional attachment is the one that makes wrinkles, calluses, even imperfections exquisite as they belong to a beloved. The beauty that comes from years of dedication taking its toll and shaping our bodies in unique ways, sometimes telling stories and inviting us in. The one odd tooth, scar, or habit that becomes so inextricable and thus charming, to the extent that one suddenly cannot do without. Where is this line between... some modern but anonymous Adonis, and the "normal" and perhaps unassuming man you love, whose face you just want to eat? But more seriously (but not less truly), I think even of my own mother, who in her time was "renowned" for being quite beautiful, to the extent that it was once said of her more than once that she "never paid for her own drinks." I think she struggled with aging because I think it eventually became, to her, something that seemed to define her value-- not knowing that to us children she was beautiful even when her hair was yet unbrushed in the morning, or she was peeling potatoes to go with dinner. 

And as the line is so often drawn and moved by culture, where does it begin and end? Does higher culture lend itself to different ideals, based on different social priorities, or is there truly something we may yet pin down that transcends all culture? I don't doubt, for instance, that these two realms do not conflate so often that they might seem inseparable... Perhaps the ideal is, as usual, for the inner ideal to match the outer; or else, is that statuesque form truly appealing if it was filled with cruelty? I don't know. I feel like... It does, still, that's the thing. Like sad lyrics played to a happy tune...

And then further, there is beauty that is not embodied, but felt. The first breath of an infant-- a crumpled thing covered with vernix and blood, still somehow filling the heart to bursting. The sort of... awe-inspiring purity that comes with the love and trust of children and animals. Bonds between adults. Even the deep admiration that comes from understanding the sacrifices of another, and how much they must carry in the name of their cause. Gorgeous. And yet... detached from any embodied factors.

So.... Before spiralling too far, I suppose the question is: 

1- Is "beauty" only complete if it is holistically so?

2- Is it in some way (but not blasphemously) triune in its emanation, to be appreciated equally in different combinations?

3- In any case, where does it come from? And is it somehow related to Joy?

(I think perhaps I will turn this into a Part I and II.)