Category Archives: parents

What I Learned about My Dad’s Vietnam Deployment from Reading The Women by Kristin Hannah

Photo by Kirt Morris on Unsplash

I was fifteen years old when my father went to war in Vietnam, not old enough to understand the news or to pay attention to adult worries. But I remember my dad standing at the front door with my mother hanging onto him, tears streaming down her face.

When my dad came home, we expected that he’d sit in his big armchair set in a corner of the living room, gather his children around his feet, and tell stories about what he saw. But he didn’t. He sat in his armchair, staring at the blank television with furrows in his brow for hours each night after work and during the long afternoons on the weekend. We crept past his chair silently afraid of his morose temperament.

When I discovered The Women by Kristin Hannah, I thought it would be an opportunity for me to learn about my father’s Vietnam experience that he never shared with us. The book tells the story of a young woman, Frances Grace McGrath, who becomes a nurse and signs up to serve in the army in Vietnam in 1965. She joins the Army Nurse Corps since the Air Force and Navy require her to have more clinical experience than she has.

Frances, known as Frankie, is inspired to sign up for service because her father has a wall in his study of the family’s military heroes, and she wants to be on that wall. The only woman on the wall is her mother in a wedding picture. Just before her brother leaves for the war, one of his friends tells her that women can be heroes, too.

My father, on the other hand, tried to avoid going to Vietnam. By 1965, he had been in the Air Force for twelve years and was a senior flight mechanic, a valuable skill for a war being fought with helicopters and airplanes. 1965 was the year that President Johnson increased troop deployment to Vietnam and began direct combat operations to shore up the South Vietnamese defense against the communist Viet Cong and North Vietnamese forces. My father petitioned not to be sent, so he was deployed instead to Mildenhall, a U.S. Air Force base in the United Kingdom. I was only nine years old. The bad news was that he had to leave his circle of friends in California to serve there for almost four years. The good news was that his family could join him, his wife and all nine kids. We came back to California in 1969. But this alternate deployment did not protect him from being shipped off to Vietnam.

In 1972, when the war was raging and tempers were flaring at home about it, I still didn’t know much about the war even though I had seen pictures of U. C. Berkeley students protesting it on television.

In April 1972, my dad closed the front door on his family and flew to serve at Cam Ranh Bay, an air base Vietnam used for the offloading of supplies, military equipment, and as a major Naval base. My father was assigned to serve as the senior flight mechanic on a huge transport plane known as a C-5B, a plane that can transport a fully equipped combat unit with oversized cargo. He wrote numerous letters home. In one, he writes about how he sprained his ankle in the shower. In another, he describes how a bomb went off outside the plane, the noise ringing in his ears.

I know my father took soldiers to the front lines and brought home dead men in body bags. He didn’t tell us that, but when I read about the use of C5-B planes, that’s what I learned. I know also that the planes were used to rescue Vietnamese women and children and bring them to the United States. Once, my father described how they had to shut the cargo door to keep out the hordes of civilians trying to board the plane.

After my father died and I was helping my mother with his estate, I came across some paperwork relating to a lawsuit about Agent Orange. Apparently, my father had been exposed to it in Vietnam. I had heard of it and thought that it was some kind of chemical used in a war. In The Women, I learned that it was a deadly herbicide used to kill jungle foliage to prevent the Viet Cong from hiding. Exposure to it causes cancer, birth defects, and other illnesses. My father died when he was 76 years old from heart trouble. His grandfather had lived to the age of 98 years old. Could he have lived longer if he hadn’t been exposed to Agent Orange?

Dad only stayed in Vietnam for eight months. He came home early since President Nixon had decided to withdraw U.S. troops by January 1973. Dad flew into Beale Air Force Base and my mother rushed to see him as soon as he landed.

By 1972 in the book, Frankie is home, experiencing nightmares and guilt for being part of a war that Americans didn’t want. She had seen soldiers without limbs, chest wounds, and mangled heads. They haunted her in her dreams, and when loud noises went off around her, she ducked for cover.

I don’t know if my father had nightmares like Frankie. I don’t know how the war protesters made him feel. Unlike Frankie, whose military service was ignored by her family and country, I think my father had emotional support waiting for him at home. My parents had a large community of friends in their church, who rallied around him when he returned. Finally, after months of grim silence, he got out of his armchair and settled into life again. A few years later, he retired from the Air Force and went back to school to get his contractor’s license. His last job was building candy stores for See’s Candies.  

Frankie’s story taught me how the women who served in Vietnam received little or no credit for their valor even from their own families. As a woman, I’ve experienced a lot of inequality, so the story affected me deeply. But as the child of a soldier in Vietnam whose life was profoundly affected by a parent’s suffering,  I’m thankful that it uncovered some of the mystery of my father’s Vietnam deployment.

Sausage Roll Saturdays

One of my favorite comfort foods is a sausage roll – a flaky pastry crust surrounding a warm filling of seasoned ground sausage. When I went shopping with my mother on Saturday at the outdoor market in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, England, she bought each of us a sausage roll just before we got on the bus to go home. 

But a lot happened before that magical moment. When we arrived at about 9 a.m., my mother let me wander around by myself while she and her woven basket went grocery shopping. First, I crept into the 900-year-old Moyses Hall, the town museum built of stone. One of its twin-pointed roofs was topped by a steeple and weather-vane. A gigantic clock built into the stone kept time for the market-goers. Like a slueth, I inspected the manacles used for prisoners during Medieval times, gawked at paintings of local pastoral scenes, and read about superstitions and witchcraft.

Next, I hurried over to Boots, a pharmacy store that had two stories. On the second floor, the shelves were filled with fragrant soaps, lotions, and bath salts. I held my nose over the shelves, inhaling the scents one by one. Once in a while, when I had a little money, I’d buy a single rose or lavendar-scented bath salt square to keep in my dresser drawer. 

My final destination was the Waterstones Bookstore, a narrow retail space lined with wooden shelves from floor to ceiling, filled with more books than I had ever seen in my life. I found tomes of fairy tales stashed in the shelves in the back corner of the store. Since I had no money to buy one, I sat on the floor, cross-legged with a book in my lap, and read as long as I could, absorbing the words and stories into my brain so I could think about them long after I went home. 

But magical mornings never last long enough. Too soon, it was 11:45 and time to meet my mother at the bus stop. When I arrived, she held a greasy Purdy’s bakery bag in her hand with two sausage rolls. We ate them on the bus, licking the flakes of pastry off our fingers and wishing that the morning didn’t have to end.

What Really Makes Me Tick (Happy)

Wouldn’t it be a better world if everyone knew what they needed to be happy? I’m retired, and I loved my teaching job; however, now that I don’t have to commute to work five days a week or grade college essays on the weekends, I just want to do things that make me happy. Here they are.

Admiring Flowers

Stopping to smell a rose may seem like an unimportant action, but, when I do it, it brings me joy. I have rose bushes in my front yard and back yard, and every morning, I wander outside to inspect every bush to see the new blooms. I sniff and stare and smile to my heart’s content.

I remember the flowers of my childhood, too. In January, crocuses poked out of the soil in the flower beds in the front yard. In February, the daffodils came. Tulips arrived in March, and Irises after them.  By the time Lent was over, Easter Lilies grew like sophisticated ladies in white hats in our back yard. And in May, the meadows were carpeted with Bluebells.

For four years of my childhood, I lived in England with my family, and I was impressed by the colorful blooms of summer that thrived in the temperate climate. Rambling roses climbed up cottage walls. Cosmos waved their rainbow heads in the breezes like pretty bonnets. Hydrangeas brightened shady nooks of gardens with their puffy burst of blue and pink. I was entranced by their beauty.

At Christmas, my mother bought at least one Poinsettia to decorate the house. She bought red poinsettias, white poinsettias, and ones with white flowers with red stripes. Sometimes, she had an amaryllis bulb growing in a pot. Every day, I’d inspect it to see whether it was blooming or not. I was in more of a hurry than it was.

Making a Stew or Pot of Soup

Whenever my dad cooked, he made “water” soup. He added pieces of beef and vegetables to a pot of water to create soup. Ugh. We kids would cringe when we saw him taking out a pot. His were the worst soups I’ve ever tasted.

Maybe that’s why I love making delicious soups.

I own an old Dutch oven that is the perfect size for making one-pot meals. Some mornings even before I change out of my pajamas, I scour the refrigerator and pantry for the ingredients for a minestrone—onions, celery, carrots, zucchini, chick peas, barley, chicken broth, chopped tomatoes, oregano, salt, and pepper. Sometimes I add cooked shredded chicken. Often, I don’t.

Or I find the fixings for chicken noodle soup for a recipe from a William’s Sonoma Soups book that I bought a long time ago. While I’m chopping the carrots and celery for this soup and simmering the chicken breasts in the broth, I think back when I made this for my two children who loved it. I see their little faces above their steaming bowls, their hands holding spoons, their mouths filled with savory egg noodles.

On one European trip, I bought cookbooks in the Czech Republic and Austria, so when I want to make goulash, I search for recipes from those books. My favorite goulash is a beef, onion, and smoked paprika concoction that is topped with cornmeal dumplings. I first ate cornmeal dumplings at the restaurant at the Belvedere Palace Museum in Vienna. I’m still practicing to make mine taste as good as those were.

Reading Inside When It’s Cold Outside

To me, the essence of decadence is waking up in the morning, seeing that it’s cold and rainy outside, then reaching for a novel and reading it in bed. To take all the time in the world to read a story, then stopping and thinking about it is heaven on earth.

Reading when its cold outside reminds me of when I read as a child. I had time to sit on the floor in a corner of the house with a treasured book of fairy tales and get lost in another world. When my mother took me to the open-air market, I found the bookstore, walked to the back shelves, pulled out a tome, and read it while sitting on the floor. I was always afraid that the shop owner would find me and kick me out, but he never did.

Decorating My Home

When I was a child, we never had an expensive home, but that didn’t keep us from making it beautiful. In the spring and summer, I picked flowers in the meadows, poked them into vases and brightened every table and dresser in the house. In the fall, I cut branches of colored leaves for the mantel in the living room. For winter, my mother and I found pine cones and spray-painted them silver and gold for Christmas. We added holly and pine branch garlands in-between them.

Today, when a new season comes, I still have the irresistible urge to celebrate it with seasonal décor. Right now, I have a collection of pumpkins on my front porch accompanied by a little witch. I also have put pumpkins on the table on the back patio so we can feel the season when we go outside in the afternoons. Every time I pass these decorations, I feel like celebrating.

Writing

I wrote my first poem when I was nine years old, and I’ve been writing ever since. Sometimes, I use writing to help me sort out a problem. Currently, I’m the chair of a scholarship committee for a charitable organization. When I’m planning the meeting agendas, I write them to organize my thoughts. When I’m thinking about how to improve my author’s platform, I write my thoughts down. I write down daily affirmations and New Year’s Eve resolutions. I write every day.

Even when I’m traveling, I have a journal that I use to take notes or write a spontaneous poem. I remember one vacation that I took by myself to Boston. After I toured Paul Revere’s tomb and all of Boston’s historic sites, I drove north up the Atlantic coast. I stopped in Salem and visited another graveyard where a huge oak tree that had gotten so big over the centuries that tombstones were poking out of its bark halfway up. There was so much to write about. Finally, I stopped the car at the edge of the road near a beach. As I sat in the sand and gazed over the surging navy-blue sea, I wrote a poem about the peace that I felt.  

When I visited Sorrento, Italy, I stayed in the Grand Hotel Excelsior Vittoria. Our room had a large terrace that overlooked the Sorrento Harbor. Across the Bay of Naples with its slate-blue ripples, we could see Mount Vesuvius. Every day, I sat at the patio table on this terrace with my journal to write about the gorgeous scenery or about my excursions into the town of Sorrento or its nearby attractions. I wrote how my husband had to scrunch down going into the Blue Grotto Cave in Capri. I described the ceramic factories that we toured in Almalfi. With words, I wondered what it was like to be a citizen of Pompeii in 79 AD when Mount Vesuvius spewed its lava all over the populated city.

Now that I think about it, I’ve been doing these happy things my whole life. Naturally. Now, though, I have more time to do them. What joy.

The Sugar Cookie Grandma

Grandma Lillian in her 40s

Back in my grandmother’s day, women didn’t get much notoriety, so I decided to write a blog about my Grandma Lillian. She’s not famous, but she deserves some long-overdue attention.

Grandma Lillian was born in Winona, Minnesota on November 9, 1903. Both of her parents’ families were originally from Trhove Swiny, South Bohemia, which is now part of the Czech Republic. This town dates back to the 1200s as part of an ancient trade route. In the 1400s, King Vladislaus II, who was then King of Bohemia, authorized the town to build a market. The town’s name comes from the Czech word trh which means market. The two most popular sites in Trhove Swiny are The Most Holy Trinity Church, which replaced a Catholic pilgrimage chapel, and an iron mill called Buškův hamr.

My Grandma Lillian, however, never visited the Czech Republic. In fact, she never traveled outside the United States except for Canada. She was a short woman, less than five feet tall, and a little plump. When she first married my grandfather Leon Jr., she lived in his father’s house on an 800-acre piece of property that is now a Minnesota State Park. Later, she and her husband bought their own house in Goodview, a town next to Winona. The house was painted white and sat on a flat parcel of land covered in shamrock green grass with a large vegetable garden in the back. Her brother Leo lived next door.

Grandma Lillian’s House in 2022

Grandma Lillian had five children, including my father who was the oldest. Then came David, Mary, Gerald, and Daniel. My father moved to California with the United States Air Force which stationed him at Mather Air Force Base. Once my parents came to California, they settled down to stay.

Grandma Lillian took the train to California several times to help my parents when my mother was in the hospital having another child. During these times, I learned about who she was as a person. I watched her embroider cotton tea towels, one for every day of the week. For each day, she embroidered a kitten performing a different kitchen task with one exception. For example, on Thursday’s towel, the kitten was carrying a tea kettle to the stove. On Sunday, the kitten was not doing kitchen work since she was going to church. She taught me how to embroider, but I was too impatient to make the stitches neat.

Even though Grandma Lillian didn’t ever travel to Bohemia, she used many recipes that came from the old country. She was famous for her Refrigerator Pickles. To make these, she combined seven cups of sliced cucumbers and one sliced yellow onion with a tablespoon of salt. She let the salt leach some of the water out of the cucumbers for about an hour. For the dressing, she combined one cup of vinegar, two cups of sugar, and one teaspoon of celery seed. She poured this over the cucumbers and stored the dish in the refrigerator to use as needed. By the time her recipe reached my family, we were eating the pickles as a side salad, all in one day.

My favorite memory about Grandma Lillian was how she made sugar cookies. Maybe we didn’t have cookie cutters. Maybe we didn’t have the shapes of cookie cutters that Grandma wanted. I don’t recall, but I do remember how Grandma folded a piece of newspaper in half and used scissors to cut out a heart about the size of her hand. Then she placed the heart shape over the rolled-out cookie dough and cut the dough with a sharp knife to make heart-shaped cookies. She placed the hearts on a cookie sheet and decorated them with colorful sprinkles. When we ate them warm out of the oven, they were buttery sweet.

Grandma loved to garden both vegetables and flowers. Many days, she spent hours out in her garden weeding, pruning, harvesting and enjoying the ambiance. My father inherited her green thumb since he also cultivated a big garden every year to feed his family.

Grandma Lillian was in her garden when she died on July 16, 1991. The weather was over 100 degrees, and my cousin Karen found her late in the day. Now, she is buried next to her husband Leon and her youngest son Daniel in a country cemetery. She didn’t become a movie star, a Congress woman, a Supreme Court judge, or even a newscaster on television. Yet, she lives on in the lives of her thirty-one grandchildren and more than forty great-grandchildren. That’s an accomplishment of which I am proud.

Photo by Diane Helentjaris on Unsplash

Cousin Love

No one ever talks about their cousins, except my family. I have 44 first cousins that live all over the United States and beyond. I have friended many of them on Facebook. Many receive Christmas cards from me, and I visited many in Wisconsin and Minnesota this last year. I feel as close to my cousins as I do my own siblings.

My parents assured us that we would enjoy being from a large family since we’d always have friends. They were right. Even though I don’t see my cousins on a daily basis, they bring me so much joy and satisfaction.

My cousin Tim lives in Montana. He recently retired as the Superintendent of a tiny school district. Since I was a college professor, our careers were focused on helping students and improving education. We also comforted each other when we went through our divorces by sitting in a car in San Diego in the middle of the night and sharing stories after his brother’s wedding.

My cousin Roslyn is a high-school history teacher in Michigan. We both believe that students are better off when they learn history from more than one perspective and understand the difference between equity and equality since we worked with those concepts in the classroom. Roslyn is my philosophical partner in our extended family.

Carolyn lives in Winona, Minnesota. She raised her son as a happy single parent and now has two grandchildren. Yesterday, she posted a picture of her front yard packed with snow where she had painted flowers on the three-foot snow walls beside the path to her front door. What a creative spirit!

Cousin Dan lives in Japan with his wife and two pretty daughters. He works for the United States Navy and leaves his family for months at a time while stationed on the U.S.S. Reagan. I love his mustache and fun-loving family, who spend their afternoons searching for pottery on the beaches and artistic manhole covers in the towns.

My cousin Arlie is a handsome devil who has worn his once-dark-but-now-gray curly hair both long and short over the years. Once he drove a truck full of Wisconsin cheese to my parent’s house in California. We ate cheddar for weeks. Now, Arlie rides horses with his wife and works at an auto store. Even though we have little in common, at every reunion, we share heart-felt cousin hugs.

Patty lives in Boston and is married to Steve, who completely adores her. They go to baseball games and concerts on date nights, and inspire the rest of us not to give up on love. Patty sure knows how to pick a good partner.

Diane lives with her husband Matt in Minnesota. Now this is a fun girl. If you want to kayak in the Winona Lake, she’ll do it. She knows all the best restaurants in town and will even accompany you to the local spice and Polish museums for an afternoon. If you’re up for it after dinner, she’ll go with you to a bar for a beer and sit outside with the mosquitoes. One year, I watched on Facebook as she and Matt took their motorcycle on a cross-country trip through Minnesota, South Dakota, and Montana. Wow, what a woman!

Scott, a happy tall guy with a strong build, owns a dairy farm in Minnesota where he produces thousands of gallons of milk per day for American milk-drinking consumers. If you ask, he’ll take you on a tour of the farm and you’ll see where the calves are raised, cows are milked by machine, statistics are collected for each animal, and cow manure is recycled. Even a town-girl like me learns something every time I visit his farm.

I could go on talking about Lisa in Florida, Marilyn in Ohio, Marjorie in Minnesota, Randy in Minnesota, Karen in Wisconsin, Dewey, Joanne, Debbie, Denise, Renee, Kathy, Scott, Jim, and more, more, more, but you get the idea. I have interesting cousins in my life, and I interact with them frequently enough to maintain vibrant relationships.

Thank you, Mom and Dad, for maintaining such close family ties over the years. My cousins are an essential part of my happiness. I love them.

Chemotherapy Christmas

The room was large, windowless, and sterile. Blinding florescent lights. Beige linoleum floors. Twelve green reclining chairs placed with their backs against the walls around the room. Each chair accompanied by a metal stand hung with bags of fluid and tubes.

The woman sitting in one of the chairs wore a scarf around her head. I looked for wisps of hair, but couldn’t see any. Her body filled up the chair like of sack of potatoes, lumps everywhere. She wasn’t smiling like the nurse who stood next to her, hooking up a tube to a port embedded in her upper chest.

A man whose body disappeared within his baggy shirt and trousers sat in a recliner in a corner. His scrawny hands hung over the chair’s arms like shriveled leaves caught on the edge of a forgotten lawn chair in the fall. His bald head shone in the florescent lights like a bare bulb. His face was gaunt, lined, and dry, and his eyes were closed. A young woman sat in a chair in front of him reading the Bible.

I watched the room’s activity with a lump in my throat as I stood behind my mother and brother by the door. A woman with a cane was led to another recliner in the room. The male nurse helped her sit into the chair, gently pushed her back, and lifted the foot rest. The nurse lifted a matching green blanket from a small chair nearby and laid it over the woman’s body, tucking the edges around her snugly. Then he efficiently began hanging the bags of chemicals on a metal stand and hooking up the bags with the tubes.

This was my mother’s chemotherapy room. Mom’s last chemotherapy session was scheduled for December 24, Christmas Eve. She had asked my brother Zach and me to accompany her to the appointment. My brother had flown home from college in Southern California for Christmas, and I was home from college too. The only thing my mother wanted for Christmas was to finish chemotherapy with her children around her.

A female nurse wearing an ugly, plain, blue smock and pants led my mother to a chair on the emptier side of the room. Zach helped Mom take off her coat and climb into the chair. She looked small, dressed in her pink cotton beanie, pink V-neck sweater, and jeans. How pale her pretty face was. Mom nodded when the nurse asked if she wanted a blanket, and Zach took it from the nurse and covered her gently like he was placing a precious jewel into a new setting.

This was not how I wanted to spend my Christmas. Wasn’t college supposed to be one of the happiest times of my life? I was too young to worry about my mother dying or even being too sick to visit me at school.

The nurse pulled two straight-back chairs close to my mother’s recliner, and invited us to sit down. I took the chair farther away and leaned back as if my mother was contagious. My brother pulled his chair closer to Mom and took hold of her left hand. When she smiled at him, her eyes watered like green pearls.

Before long, Mom was hooked up to the tubes that would feed chemicals into her body. I could tell that she was putting on a brave face because, underneath her smile, she looked tired and weak.

I didn’t want to think about her being that way. Instead, I wanted her to jump out of her chair, hug me tight around the waist, and ask me about college. I wanted to tell her about Jasmine’s new boyfriend, Sara’s job offers, and David’s article in the college newspaper.

Her smile withered away as the chemicals dripped into her veins. She gave up trying to hold a conversation with my brother, who was bent towards her in his chair, his chocolate eyes full of concern. She looked at me several times, but I retreated away from her with a grimace on my face.  I didn’t want to be here.

Once in a while, Mom opened her eyes and looked up at the bag hanging beside her as if gaging how long she had to endure the procedure, but, for the most part, she kept her eyes closed, and we sat in front of her fidgeting in our chairs, biting our lips, and staring at each other with worried eyes.

Three hours later, the nurse in the blue smock and pants pulled the catheter out of my mother’s port, gathered up the tubes, and rolled away the metal stand with the empty bags.

A young woman with brunette hair and rosy cheeks pushed a wheel chair up to our station.  She asked my brother to move his chair, then maneuvered the wheel chair as close to my mother’s chair as she could.

“I’ll help you,” she said kindly. She took ahold of my mother’s upper arm and guided her from the recliner into the wheel chair.

My mother let out a whimper as she moved. Zach helped her put on her coat as she sat in the wheel chair, wrapped her pink scarf around her neck, and gave her a wool cap to pull over her pink beanie. Still, she shivered when the nurse wheeled her outside to the car.

Zach drove us home, and the next day was Christmas.

Green Beans & Marshmallows

My relationship with food started with a tummy ache.

 When I was born, my parents soon learned I was allergic to cow’s milk. My mother had grown up on a farm in Wisconsin where her father milked his cows to provide milk on the table. My father loved cow’s milk so much that he scooped the cream off the top of pasteurized milk with a spoon and put it in his mouth, right over the bottle. So my allergy to milk was unusual for them. To solve the problem, they bought a goat, milked it, and put the goat’s milk into my bottle.

Our family was large—two parents and ten children to feed. This meant that the preparation of food required a major effort, not just by my mother but the whole family. Since my father grew up on a farm, our first home was a rented farmhouse on top of a barn on a two-acre property in Fair Oaks, California. My dad’s day job was in the military, but before he went to work and after he got home, he milked the goat and cow, fed the chickens and ducks, collected their eggs, gave lettuce to the rabbits, sheered the sheep, picked fruit from the fruit trees, and planted, weeded, and harvested the vegetable garden.

When I was three, my parents bought a house right down the street on a half-acre lot, and it was the most prolific half-acre I’ve ever known. We didn’t keep a cow there, but we still had sheep, ducks, chickens, fruit trees, and a year-round vegetable garden. Radishes, carrots, lettuce, and green onions in the spring. Zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, and peppers in the summer. Pumpkins and acorn squash in autumn, and potatoes in the winter.  I remember running bare-foot under the plum trees over fallen, ripe plums that were magnets for the honey bees. Before I went to Kindergarten, I had been stung dozens and dozens of times each summer.

We weren’t legally allowed to work when we were kids, except as harvesters in my father’s garden. Under the blazing summer sun, I stooped between the rows of tomato plants and picked tomatoes until my arms itched with rashes. When I complained, I was switched over to the rows of green beans where the purple dragon flies terrified me as they flitted among the bean plants’ twirling tendrils.  I hated the hot sun, the rashes, the dragon flies, and the repetition of picking.

One day at the dinner table, I came up with the incredible idea that I didn’t like green beans, and, if I didn’t like them, I wouldn’t have to pick them anymore.  With this inventive scheme in mind, I looked down at the green beans on my plate and said out loud, “I don’t like green beans.” As fast as lightening, my brother stuck his fork in my green beans and lifted them over to his plate. All I had left were fish sticks and mashed potatoes, and the serving dishes on the table were all empty. Nevertheless, I spent my whole childhood hating green beans.  It wasn’t until I was around thirty that I tried them again and discovered they were delicious. 

Cow’s milk and green beans weren’t the only foods that traumatized me. My mother was a decent cook, but she often lost track of the vegetables cooking on the stove. By the time she remembered to turn off the zucchini, it had turned into a gelatinous mass of green sludge, and she made us eat it anyway. 

My mother employed her daughters as helpers in the kitchen as soon as we could reach over the counter. When we had French fries for dinner, I had to peel ten pounds of russet potatoes and slice them into French fry fingers. Then, Mom deep-fried them in oil and we cooled them on racks placed over cookie sheets. 

I never complained about not liking French fries. I loved them as much as everyone did. In fact, if I didn’t protect the fries on my plate, one of my siblings would snitch them when I wasn’t looking. The best course of action was to eat the French fries on your plate first, get another helping, then eat the rest of your food. To this day, I don’t dip my French fries in catsup while I’m eating them. When I was a kid, I didn’t have time.

Some of my food trauma also stems from the creative ways that my father punished us when he caught us committing food crimes. I think my dad could have earned a PhD in psychology if he had the notion to get more than a two-year college degree. He was thoughtful, and, because his sentences were so inventive, they were effective.  One time after dinner, he caught me popping a large marshmallow into my mouth. “You still hungry?” he asked. “Next time you eat when you’re at the dinner table.” He made me sit at the table and finish eating the leftover pork and beans. That was a “tooty” experience that I never forgot. Today I don’t even like marshmallows.

Rain

Photo by Ahmed Zayad on Unsplash

When Don woke up, it was raining.  The water that he ran in the tub sounded like rain chortling out of a storm pipe.  The water that streamed from the kitchen faucet for his tea beat into the kettle like rain on a wheelbarrow left out in the yard.  Rain. Rain. Rain.  It had rained for months.

Don’s mother had died at 10:05 a.m. on the same morning that Don worked his last day.  He was looking forward to retirement, and one thing he would do more was spend time with his mother—playing Scrabble, going out for hamburgers for lunch, driving her past her old house where prolific flowers signaled the change of seasons. 

At 10:06 on the day she died, the rain started.  He had kissed her on the forehead as she lay quiet in her hospital bed, checked to see if she was safe, and slipped out of the room to live the rest of his life without her. 

Claire had managed the funeral and service arrangements which were beautiful.  On the day Mom was buried, the sun came out for a couple hours—just enough time for Mom’s ten children to say their prayers and lay red roses on her casket.  When the casket was lowed into the ground and the earth filled in her vacancy, the grounds men laid the large spray of red roses over the dirt.

Then the rain began again.  It rained while they cleaned out Mom’s room at the assisted living home.  Maddy took all their mother’s clothes home in garbage bags.  A few weeks later, she knocked on Don’s door and handed him a teddy bear.  The bear was blue and green and peach and red, made from pieces of Mom’s shirts, pants, and dresses.  It looked both happy and sad as Don sat it on the couch in his living room.

Soon, the group texts began.  Don shared memories of his mother with his nine siblings every day.  Old memories.  Vague memories.  Disputed memories.  Sunny memories.  Rainy memories. 

Some people in the text posted pictures of what they made for breakfast.  Don posted pictures of his new seedlings and old pumpkins.  He talked about his clocks inherited from Mom and Dad.  Claire posted perfect plates of salmon dinners.  Rita identified the birds that Maddy found in her garden by looking them up in her bird bible.  Beatrice posted old photos of Mom from her twenties when she was thin, before she had ten children. 

The siblings discovered each other again.  Most of them had moved out of town since their childhood, and their communication had been through Mom for the most part.  Through their texts, they found out that Don had the best green thumb, Claire grew flowers but not vegetables, Rita was a bird and owl watcher, Maddie loved wine and dessert most of all, Beatrice was just starting a walking routine, Minnie continuously created new jam recipes, Jim was the handyman at his job, Carol had learned how to play guitar, Ron still told the best jokes, and Geo wrote poetry in his spare time. 

The texts started usually around 7 a.m. in the morning and lasted until the last sibling drifted off to bed.  Good mornings.  Breakfast recipes. Descriptions of walks.  Flower postings.  Loaves of bread.  Jars of jam.  Bowls of soup.  Directions to parks.  Comments on the news.  Revelations about hobbies.  Progress on quilts, puzzles, and charity projects.  Movie recommendations and dinner plans.  All these subjects and pictures streamed between the ten children that Mom left behind.

A few months later, the rain stopped.  The sun came out like a herald of good news, and Don woke up to the birds chirping outside his bedroom window. 

When he wandered out into his living room, he saw his colorful teddy bear leaning over on its side and bent down to sit it upright, and, as he did, the sun blazed through the window and lit up the bear in a shaft of light.

“Let’s go visit Mom, today,” Don said to his bear.  “The sun is out and I know she’ll be happy to see us.”

Half an hour later, after an oatmeal breakfast and coffee with chocolate, Don put the bear in the passenger seat of his blue truck, and drove to the cemetery.

When he got there, the sun streamed like yellow curtains through the oak trees whose branches spread over the graves like kind arms.  The green grass, which covered the shallow hills and valleys, glistened with diamonds of left-over rain. 

Don drove his truck onto the center road and stopped it in front of his parents’ graves.  There they were—lying side by side like happy campers in sleeping bags.  Their gravestone rose from the top of their plots like a crown, and Don noticed that one of his siblings had stuck some colorful plastic flowers into the metal vase in front of the headstone. 

Don knelt down in the middle of his two parent’s plots, reached out, and placed his teddy bear on his mother’s side of the stone near the flowers.

He paused for a few minutes, furrowed his brow, then recited the Hail Mary prayer, and his words wafted through the cemetery like a low whisper.  When he finished praying, he looked up at his teddy sitting quietly.

“You can’t stay here,” he said.  “We’re just visiting.  You and I have to go home and live some more.”

Don looked at the words of his mother’s name on the head stone and the dates of her birth and death.  92 years long.  Somehow, not long enough.

“Thank you for giving me life, Mom,” Don said, placing his hand on his heart gently. 

He reached over, lifted his teddy bear from the ledge beside the plastic flowers, and held the bear against his bent frame.

“I’m always here, Mom, for you, just as you were always here for me.”  Then Don slowly stood up from the ground, brushed the wet grass off his jeans, and walked back to his truck.

When he got into his seat, he checked his phone to see if any of his siblings had posted another message.  A few rain drops fell onto the windshield as he drove away. 

The Kashubian Warriors of Winona

Even the sweetest human being contains a little bit of wickedness, and the most awful person possesses at least a little goodness.  This is because each person is made from a complex collection of DNA that has been blended over and over again, generation after countless generation; furthermore, these durable genes have survived a variety of political systems, religions, geographic locations, war, peace, cruelty, and kindness—all of the experiences of their ancestors. 

One day, when I visited the Polish Museum in Winona, Minnesota, I saw a photograph of one of my ancestors, Lawrence Bronk.  I thought I was looking at a photograph of my father—a man of fine build, blonde hair, and handsome face; however, Lawrence was the brother of my Great-great-grandfather Ignatius, and he immigrated to Winona, not from Poland, but from Kashubia, a place that bordered the Baltic Sea. This man inspired me to find out just who these Kashubians were and what made them Kashubian instead of Polish.

Not only did I research the immigration of the Kashubians to North America, but I also investigated how the Kashubians settled in Kashubia.  What I found out was that I was related to people who had lived complex lives of peace, aggression, oppression, and chaos throughout the centuries.  This is their story.

After the Roman Empire dissolved in the 6th Century, Slavic tribes from the East, mainly from the Ukraine area, migrated north into Russia, west into what is now known as Germany and Poland and the Czech Republic, and south into the Adriatic Region.  These were distinct from the Germanic tribes that had migrated from Scandinavia into the Roman Empire starting in the 4th Century.

The Kashubians were a Slavic tribe that settled in Eastern Europe on the coast of the Baltic Sea at that time.  Specifically, they claimed a region of land that was south of Sweden, north of Poland, east of the German homeland, and west of Lithuania.   Their ancient territory stretches from the Kashubian capital city of Gdansk to as far as the German Capital of Berlin. It lies between the Odra River to the west and the Vistula River to the east. The whole north side borders the Baltic Sea.

During the migration, the Slavs became a nuisance to the Byzantine Empire, which was really the eastern part of the Roman Empire that lasted for a thousand years after the fall of the western Roman Empire.  Since Slavs were an adaptable species, they learned how to use the weapons of those they conquered and attacked cities instead of trade routes. 

These pillaging Slavs believed in nature, and they had adopted a mythology consisting of a pantheon of gods.  Their shamans were known for telling great tales about their gods, and the Slavs traditions and way of life were developed from these tales.  

The Byzantine rulers wished to calm these robust terrorists, so they ordered two scholars and brothers, Cyril and Methodius, to educate the Slavs in the Glagolitic alphabet, which was closely connected to the teachings of Christianity.  This is how Kashubians and other Slavs became Roman Catholics. 

When the Byzantine Empire ended, the Slavs created Slavic kingdoms across Eastern Europe, effectively squelching the influence of the Mongol tribes who wished to spread their Muslim religion. 

The Kashubs were also called Pomeranians, which translates to “the people by the sea”. When they settled by the Baltic Sea, they spent many years isolated from other Slavs and peoples.  This allowed them to develop their unique Kashubian dialect and create their own traditions, folklore, music, dance and cuisine. Their access to land induced them to become an agricultural people, farmers who worked the land to provide for their families.  They organized their smallest community structure into Catholic parishes, and their lives centered around their religion. 

Eventually, the German Empire encroached upon the independence of the Kashubian people, and Kashubia became part of Prussia.  Their German rulers forced priests to say Mass in German instead of the native Kashubian language, and the Kashubians strongly resented this.  Farmers had large families so that children could help work the land, but when these broods of children grew into adulthood, there wasn’t enough farmland for them to farm; therefore, the German government offered Kashubians free or cheap travel to North America where homesteads and land were abundant.

On May 14, 1859, three sailing ships left Hamburg, Germany for Quebec, Canada, carrying a host of Kashubian families.  The names of the ships were the Laura, Donau, and Elbe.  The river that connects Hamburg to the Baltic Sea is the Elbe, so the ship named Elba was likely named after this river, a common German practice for naming ships.

On board the Elbe were families with the surnames of von Bronk, Galewski, Kistowski, Konkel, Libera, Piekarski, Platowna, Rzenszewicz (Runsavage), Walinski, who knew each other in their homeland.  The records of the ship were posted in German using Prussia as the land of origin; however, Kashubians never did consider themselves German. 

My ancestors on the Elbe consisted of the Joseph and Francisca von Bronk family, including their five sons—Johann, Ignatz, Vincent, Lorenz, and Jacob.  Von is a German preposition meaning “from,” so this label indicates they came from a place called “Bronk.”  In the Kashubian region, there is a forest known as “Bronki” so they may have originated from that specific place.  All of the passengers listed on this ship were classified as “Landsmann,” indicating that they were farmers. 

Joseph von Bronk is my Great-great-great grandfather.  His son Ignatz, who changed the spelling of his name to Ignatius, is my Great-great grandfather mentioned above.  The family left Quebec and traveled south, eventually arriving in the Winona area before the end of 1859.  Many of the families who traveled across the Atlantic with them also settled in the Winona area.  Others stayed in Canada and founded another Kashubian town known as Wilno. 

The Winona area was a lot like their home in Kashubia where there were plentiful forests, abundant water and fishing, and land for farming.  At first, the Kashubians settled on the east side of what is now known as Winona where they established a Kashubian village.  In 1886 after his second wife died, Ignatius bought land in Pine Creek, Wisconsin.  This property is owned by my Uncle David and Aunt Linda today. 

Artifacts in the Polish Museum in Winona revealed that the Kashubians were a literary and creative people.  Many of their descendants have continued the strong story-telling and writing traditions of the culture, including me, for instance.  Their colorful embroidery and distinctive pottery are world-renowned, and their flag and national symbols are celebrated today, not only in Kashubia, but now in the Kashubian communities all over North America. 

Today, in Winona and in the surrounding farms, the Kashubian descendants live in harmony with Polish, German, and Swedish peoples.  They work in each other’s businesses, attend each other’s weddings and baptisms, and share the same merry-go-rounds. 

This is the Kashubian story.  Now this is my advice.  If you have a Kashubian neighbor, laugh at their jokes, never insult them, keep the peace.  A Kashubian is a warrior.  Behind that friendly gleam in his eye, behind her engaging smile is a constitution of ferocity.  Those DNA have migrated over mountains, through valleys, into war, across water, and have survived. 

References:

  1. Larry Reski.  Poland to Pine Creek, Wisconsin.  https://polandpinecreek.blogspot.com/2014/02/elbe-departing-from-hamburg-14-may-1859.html.
  2. Haden Chakra.  The Great Migration and Early Slavic History.  https://about-history.com/the-great-migration-and-early-slavic-history/.
  3. Welcome to Wilno. Wilno.com.

Cousins in Every Direction

Way back in the 1860’s, my great-great-grandfather Ignatius immigrated to Wisconsin with his four brothers.  They all had families.  My great-grandfather Leon had seven siblings.  Most of them had families.  My grandfather Leon had six siblings; all of them, except for his brother Phillip who became a priest, had families.  His brother Ed had fourteen children.  His brother George had nine offspring.  Many farmers had large families so they could use their children to provide free labor on the family farm. 

My father had four siblings, and they had children.  My father had ten children.  His brother David had ten children.  And between his siblings Gerald, Mary and Daniel, there were eleven more descendants.  Now those descendants have children and so do their offspring. 

Then, there is the maternal side of my family.  Two families dominate this line of my heritage: the Konkels and the Jereczeks, families who immigrated to the Pine Creek area of Wisconsin in the 1800’s as well.  I’m still working out the threads of my great-great-grandparents, but I’m clear about the progeny of my Great-grandpa John Jereczek and his wife Pelagia Konkel.  They had eight farm laborers—excuse me, eight children.  One of them was my grandfather August.  He married Florence Gibbons, a woman from a large Irish family that immigrated to the area during the Irish Potato Famine.  Everyone in every generation had large families. 

Truly a cousin conundrum.  I have first cousins, second cousins, thirds, fourths, cousins-removed in a lot of different ways, over-the-hill-cousins, and near-and-far cousins. Between the farming community of Altura, Minnesota—throughout Winona—and into the farming communities of Dodge and Pine Creek, Wisconsin, I am in danger of running into one of my cousins at any time in any place—as the owner of a dairy farm, at church, in a restaurant, at a grocery store, or on a hike in the state park which used to belong to my great-grand-father Leon. If you count the relatives who live outside of this area—in Minneapolis, Florida, Massachusetts, Michigan, Ohio, Colorado, Montana, Idaho, and California, my cousin count is exponential.

What really is a cousin? I did a little research and found a definition.  The website Who Are You Made Of? defines a cousin as “anyone who shares a common ancestor with you and is not a direct descendant of you or your siblings, a direct ancestor, or a sibling of a direct ancestor.”  This definition certainly proves that I have hundreds of cousins, most of whom I probably will never know since I can’t even keep the names of my great aunts and uncles straight. 

I recently visited the Wisconsin/Minnesota area where my ancestors first landed in America, and I had such a fabulous time with my relatives—mostly cousins—that I became inspired to better understand this voluminous family of mine.  I do understand who my first cousins are.  They are the children of my aunts and uncles.  I have 44 first cousins—the children of my father’s and mother’s siblings.  When I visited a few days ago, I was able to see about 25 of them.  What a fun group they are—laughing, joking, telling stories, recalling memories, and thinking of the next fun social opportunity. 

My children’s names are Alex and Rachael.  Since I have nine brothers and sisters who have produced a total of eighteen children amongst them, my children have eighteen first cousins just from my side of the family, two from their dad’s side. 

The thing is, my first cousins now have children, like I do.  With a little more research, I found out that my cousins’ children are my first cousins-once removed.  They are also the second cousins of my children.  This means that all of the children of my 44 first cousins—I can’t even begin to tabulate this number—are Alex and Rachael’s second cousins. 

One day on my visit, I went to the Bronk Nursery which is owned by the son of my Great-uncle Ed—one of Ed’s fourteen children–Donald.  Later that night, Donald had a beer with me and some of my first cousins at Wellington’s Pub and Grill in Winona.  We sat outside while the sun set, and when the darkness descended, the mosquitoes started to feed on us with a relentless enthusiasm.  Since Donald is my father’s first cousin, I believe he is my first-cousin-once-removed. 

My brother Ron and sister Margaret were on this visit with me.  On Sunday, they went to church in Lewiston, Minnesota to meet Greg, the son of our Great-uncle George.  Since Greg is my father’s first cousin, Greg is also our first-cousin-once-removed.  Oh boy.

Another time when I visited Winona, I went to a restaurant with some of my first cousins, and the waitress turned out to be the daughter of my Great-aunt Agnes, who preferred to be called Florence.  The waitress’s name was Paula Doerr.  She was also my father’s first cousin, which also made her my first-cousin-once-removed. 

This visit, I was looking for a restaurant for another dinner and I found a bar owned by the Gibbons family.  This name shows up in my mother’s heritage line. I don’t know whether these bar owners are first-cousins-once-removed or even worse.  After visiting several cemeteries where I was related to an incredible number of inhabitants, I was becoming overwhelmed by all the relationship possibilities. 

Think about all the tombstones connected to me.  In the Sacred Heart Cemetery in Pine Creek, there are 27 Jereczeks and at least 7 Bronk headstones.  There are dozens of Konkels, Gibbons and Broms, too, and they are all related to me.  My Great-grandfather Leon and more Bronks and Broms are buried in St. Mary’s Cemetery which turned out to be only half a mile from my hotel.  My Grandfather Leon and Grandmother Lillian are buried in Fremont Cemetery–a pastoral place in the country with their son Daniel who died when he was only 29.  I even have a great-great-great grandmother who is buried under Mankato Avenue in Winona, Minnesota.  When they laid out the streets for the City of Winona, they never moved her body. Her husband is likely buried nearby since we don’t know where he is.

I didn’t meet any of my second, third, or fourth cousins that I know of, but I know they’re walking around the Minnesota and Wisconsin dells somewhere.  My research revealed that I share DNA with all of these cousins, and that anyone beyond a third cousin is considered a distant cousin. 

I’m married, but if I was single, I could marry my third cousin.  Queen Elizabeth II married Price Phillip who was her third cousin, both descendants of Queen Victoria. 

It’s comforting to know that I come from such an ample family.  I am close to many of my first cousins, and even if I don’t see them on a day-to-day basis, when we do see each other, we take up just where we left off the last time we spoke.  We support each other through both happy and sad family occasions: weddings, births, graduations, and deaths.  My life would feel so much lonelier without them.  Luckily, cousin love doesn’t have any DNA restrictions. 

A Tule Fog Morning

When I walked outside to get the newspaper this morning, tule fog blanketed my world. The blades of grass chilled my slippered feet, and the air bathed my face in cold breath. The street lamps glowed like steaming, yellow jewels. Houses wore shrouds of gauze, and both ends of the street disappeared into a thick, milky blanket.

I grew up in Sacramento where tule fog covers the neighborhoods, hills, and American River from November to early March. When the humidity is high and the nights cool down fast, the condensation lifts from the ground like a thick mist, as white as a clean sheet.

I paused in the front of my house to enjoy the mystical sensation. I couldn’t see any details past about a hundred feet, and the whole morning was clothed in mystery. My heart skipped a couple beats at the excitement of remembering long bicycle rides in the tule fog, not knowing whether I’d be cycling head-on into a mailbox or a person walking on the street. I rode slowly, but deliberately, tempting the fog to clear just in time to save my life from a disaster.

While I was standing outside this morning, my almost bare feet chilling, my arms cupped around my torso, holding my robe together, I felt the thrill of the mystery of not knowing what the fog was hiding.

Mystery is an exciting part of life. We never know what will happen the next day, the next year, or the next decade, even if we plan conspicuously. Life has a way of retaining a sense of mystery.

I thought back to the day when I was nine-years-old, writing my first poem. When I was a teenager and I got up early in the morning to walk in the dew-filled yard just so I could write a poem about how it looked. About when I won the Cadbury’s Essay Contest before I ever knew that writing would become my major passion. Mystery.

I thought back to the times when my parents and nine brothers and sisters celebrated Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter, sitting around a plain, mahogany dining room table. Later, when some of us got married and had kids, the food would be set off to the buffet; we’d line up, say prayers, and then jostle for a seat. Lots of fried chicken, sliced ham, potato salad, broccoli salad, a tray of raw vegetables, ranch dip, fruit salad, pecan pie, trifle, and pop out of the can. Never would I have imagined that these family dinners would create an unbreakable bond between me and my siblings that is even more important now that both of our parents have passed. Mystery.

I thought back to my first college adventure when I majored in accounting. I planned to work in finance my whole career since it was a good field for women at the time. I admired my mother’s sharp ability to manage money, and thought that this major would give me the independence I sought. I did. What I didn’t know was that my love of writing would eventually win out, and I’d go to graduate school to become an English professor. The change was exciting, and I’m sure a lot of the excitement came from studying a completely different topic.

I saw myself in a silk wedding dress walking down the aisle of a church in Sonoma, California toward my first husband. The mystery of not knowing that the marriage would become a disaster allowed me to stay married for nineteen years, long enough to almost get my two beloved children raised and launched, and long enough for me to pick my crippled self off the floor and walk decidedly out the door to a healthier life.

So this morning when I stood in my robe in awe at the impenetrable tule fog, I became astutely aware that my life was still full of mystery, and I felt excited. Will I ever truly become fluent in Spanish? Will I ever get the chance to fly to Argentina to visit my son-in-law’s mother and be able to chat with her?

Will I finish writing my novel? If I finish it, will I publish it? If it’s published, will I visit bookstores to read and sign it?

Will I live to be sixty-five, seventy, eighty, or ninety? If I do, will I be able to write until the very end, or will my health limit my ability to follow my passion.

That’s the thing about mystery and the future. We just don’t know what’s going to happen until it happens. This forces us to focus on the present and helps us do the best we can now so that our future has a chance of imitating our dreams.

The tule fog covered the ground for hours this morning, reminding me to make the best of my day. That’s as far as I really can see.

My Christmas Story

I had a fabulous Christmas with my husband and family. My spouse’s eyes lit up like candles when he kissed me and said, “Merry Christmas.” My two-and-a-half year old granddaughter spent two hours drawing on the paper tablecloth with me at Christmas Eve lunch. Her impish smile radiated up as she labeled her squiggly circle as a “rock.” These moments made me happy, but my Christmas blazed with joy on December 20 when I helped Youth Homes organize a holiday party for their former foster young adults at Clayton Valley Bowl in Concord.

Youth Homes is a non-profit organization that provides homes for youth who have grown too old to be housed in foster care, but who don’t have enough experience or financial means to live on their own. Most of their youth take daily medication to help regulate anxiety or other emotional conditions resulting from their troubled pasts. Some have been sexually abused. Others are victims of physical violence. Some have experienced homelessness under cold freeway overpasses, and others have lost parents to prison or untimely death.

With my partner from the Alamo Women’s Club, I arrived at Clayton Valley Bowl at 2 p.m. with boxes of gifts and envelopes of gift cards. We wore double masks to ward off any Covid viruses that might be floating around in such a public place and carried the heavy boxes through the glass doors of the building, across the tattered carpet to the back of the dull, cavernous room.

My friend is a miniature five-foot-tall, sixty-five-year-old woman, but she and I pulled ten foot folding tables out of the side hallway and set them up against the dirty white walls to display our gifts. I wet a paper towel in the nearby restroom to clean sticky patches off of two round tables.

On one long table, we arranged knit hats made by the knitting group of our club; they came in every color imaginable, knitted by hand and by looms by senior women who felt good sharing their talents with people who needed them. Next to the hats, we lined up pillow cases made from floral, Christmas, cowboy, leaves, patchwork and other fabric designs. Each youth would get to take home two of these. Beside the pillow cases, we spread out rows of brightly colored placemats, also made by talented women, generous with their money and time. Each youth could choose two of these.

On the second table, we set up an assortment of prizes, such as a George Forman burger grill, little purses, cozy socks, hand knit scarves, gift bags of candies, and make-up kits. Each youth could trade in his or her raffle ticket for one of these.

The manager of Youth Homes arrived just before 3 p.m. and he greeted us with sparkling eyes, a Christmas mask that wrinkled when he smiled, and knuckle handshakes. Slowly, one by one and two by two, the youth arrived with shy faces and quiet demeanors.

Most of the youth seemed to be about eighteen to twenty two years old. They were tall, small, skinny, overweight, light-skinned, dark-skinned, male, female, happy, and sad.

One girl, taller and larger than me, with dark skin and a head of long, black braids, had taken great care with her outfit. She wore fashionably-torn blue jeans, a plain white Tshirt, and a pretty turquoise, brushed-cotton plaid, long-sleeved shirt. I complimented her immediately and guided her to the two round tables so she could first sign the thank you cards for the donors of all the gifts. When she got to the raffle prize table, she chose the George Forman hamburger grill so she could cook hamburgers in her bedroom.

One young man, about five-feet, six-inches tall, messy dark curly hair, and a warm voice chose all of his presents with his mother in mind. For her, he chose a flowered placemat, a pink pillowcase, and a pink hat with a large tassel. The light in his eyes was soft and tender as he picked up a gift bag of candy for Mom at the raffle-prize table.

Another youth showed my partner and I her artistic eye make-up and proudly proclaimed that she was now working as an event planner. “My job requires a lot of creativity,” she said. She signed the donor thank you cards with a large, flamboyant signature.

Also arriving one-by-one, came the counselors, who worked with these youth, guiding them in their daily living and helping them overcome emotional handicaps and the lack of family support. Ed wore blue jeans and a bright blue shirt; his jolly, outgoing, gregarious personality made us feel appreciated and welcome.

Cheyenne remembered me from two of the online college success workshops that she had conducted for the youth from the interior of her car. During these workshops, I taught the youth how college differed from high school and gave them tips for being successful in college. When she recognized me, I really felt part of the Youth Homes family.

Later, I found out that these counselors would have dinner with the youth on Christmas Day and then take them out for a movie so that none of them would be alone on the holiday. I knew I would be spending Christmas with my family, but part of me wanted to tag along with them, doing what I could to show them how much I wished for them to be happy.

For two hours, we guided the young adults through the gift lines, ensuring that they all received hand-made presents. We gave them $50 gift cards from Target or Kohl’s, and we watched the counselors set up bowling teams, bring out boxes of pizza and jugs of soda, and circle among the youth like they were the best of friends.

Finally, we boxed up the remaining beanie hats, pillowcases, placemats, and raffle prizes for the manager to take back to the office for any youth who couldn’t make it. We tucked the left-over gift certificates into the envelope and handed them over for safe keeping. New youth came into the program at any time, and they all needed clothes, personal items, and financial support.

The counselors masks wrinkled into beaming smiles as they wished us a happy holiday. Some of the youth looked up with big eyes from their pizza as we passed by their tables. Others shouted “thank you” and waved. Two of the larger youth continued playing a competitive bowling game, so when both of them bowled a strike back to back, I raised my firsts and yelled, “Alright!”

Christmas was still a few days away, but, this day, this afternoon that I spent in a dim-lighted bowling alley with no manger scene, no Santa Claus, no reindeer, no twinkling lights, became my favorite day of Christmas 2021.

Wisdom of the Trees: Chapter 2/3

Chapter 2 – Birch

During the last week of class, Profesora Casti took the class on field trips so the international students could experience the culture of Buenos Aires.

On Monday, the class walked to the Manzana de Las Luces.  Profesora Casti explained that this was the Block of Enlightenment and contained some of the oldest buildings in Buenos Aires, including the Baroque church of San Ignacio, a church built by the Jesuits between 1686 and 1722. 

The students listened as their instructor explained how the Jesuits also built a school, museum, and pharmacy on the site, and operated all of them until the Spanish came and suppressed the Jesuits.  Since then, the site has been transformed into a university, cathedral, and Argentina’s first medical college.  Later, the Spanish opened Buenos Aires’ first printing press and orphanage on the site, extending its colorful and diverse history. 

What most fascinated Leonie was the warren of tunnels underneath the street, once used to store ammunition during Argentina’s fight for independence.  The students followed each other single file through the narrow, brick tunnels, stooping their heads low under the arched ceilings.  Here and there, the tunnels stopped, the entryways blocked by dirt and rocks from centuries of neglect. Utility lights lit up the corridors, and the lights created shadows on the walls that walked with them. 

When they came outside again, the sunlight blinded Leonie, and she shielded her eyes with her arm, squinting and squeezing her eyes shut until they became adjusted to the brightness.  The students sat down on stone walls in the courtyard to rest.

Leonie sat next to an older woman who was wearing a straw hat and drinking out of a metal flask.   Beside the woman leaned a walking stick, hewn out of white wood marled with yellow scars.  Leonie had never seen a walking stick so beautiful and unusual.

“Are you wondering about my stick?” the woman asked suddenly.

Leonie looked down at the ground quickly, fluttering her eyelids.  “Yes, I am,” responded Leonie.  “It’s so unusual.  What kind of wood is that?”  She slowly raised her eyes to look at the stick and then noticed the woman’s smile.

“I carved this out of birch wood when I was about your age, a wood that signifies new beginnings.  I can see that you are about to start a long journey, one that will give you a new beginning and help you find out your life’s purpose.”

Leonie opened her eyes wide and stared into the woman’s face.  “How did you know that I was going on a journey?  How did you know I was searching for my purpose in life?”

“I am an old soul, and old souls can read energy.  From your energy, I can see that you have suffered a great loss, but this loss will help you gain wisdom and strength, and, in the end, the loss will become your constant companion.”

“My mother died, and I miss her terribly.”  Leonie sank onto the rock perch, remembering the last time she saw her mother’s face.  Her mother had been beautiful, even when she suffered from the cancer.  Her face always glowed with an even sunny complexion, and her smile lit up her eyes like emeralds under a jeweler’s lamp light. 

“The first thing you need to do is to write down your affirmations,” said the old woman, rustling her wide skirts as she turned more to face Leonie.  “Whatever you wish to have, write it down like your already have it.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”  Leonie scratched the back of her head.

“An affirmation is a positive assertion that claims something is true.  When you put forth a personal affirmation, all of creation conspires to help you attain it.” 

“That sounds very interesting,” said Leonie, “but my father wants me to go home right after I finish this Spanish class.  I keep thinking I should stay here longer so I can find out what to do with the rest of my life.”

“You must learn how to believe in yourself and not to rely on the opinions of anyone else.  Your father cares for you, but your life is not his.  You must follow your own heart, or you will feel like you are not living.”  The woman stuck one of her tanned hands into the folds of her skirt and took out a small book, about the size of Leonie’s cell phone. 

“This is a gift from me.  Inside this journal are blank pages.  Today, start writing down your affirmations, and then your life and fulfillment will begin.”  The woman smiled at Leonie just as the sun poked through the branches of an oak tree.  Leonie had to close her eyes it was so bright, and when she opened them, the woman with the birch walking stick was gone.

That night, Leonie sat up in bed, the journal opened before her, a pen in her hand.  She wrote—I want to make a difference.  No, that wasn’t right.  The old woman had told her to write as if what she wanted was already true.  She put a line through the sentence and tried again—I am making a difference, she wrote.

Pressing the journal to her chest, she leaned back to see if she felt better.  No.  She still felt like she hadn’t a clue of what to do or how she could contribute to the world. 

Contribute—a good word, she thought.  She wrote another sentence underneath the first one—I am contributing something positive to the world.  Now she felt a little better.  The way she would make a difference would be by contributing something positive.  She didn’t know what that was yet, but she was determined to find out. 

Leonie placed the journal and pen on her nightstand, turned out the lamp, laid her head on her pillow, and fell asleep with a feint smile on her face.

Chapter 3 – Myrtle

On Wednesday, Profesora Casti took the class to Iglesia de Santa Felicitas on Calle Isabel la Catolica in the Barracas District.  The students learned that this church was built in the early nineteenth century in honor of Felicia Antonia Guadalupe Guerrero, considered to be the most beautiful woman in Buenos Aires.  Her husband died from yellow fever, leaving her a widow.  Later, she was killed by her rejected suitor, Enrique Ocampo. 

Leonie walked through the eclectic gothic interior of the church, gazing into the faces of the marble statues of Felicitas and her son and husband.   Around the perimeter of the church, she paused in front of the stained-glass windows, looking into the faces of the saints and admiring the colors of the roses.  She was so intrigued by how the natural light lit up the panes of glass that she didn’t see the young girl until she bumped into her.

“I’m sorry, said Leonie.  I didn’t see you there.  I was so interested in these beautiful windows.”

The girl didn’t respond.  She seemed lost in thought and sad.

“Are you o.k.?” asked Leonie.  She gently touched the girl on her wrist, which she noticed was tied with a long, red ribbon.

The girl was about the same age as Leonie.  She had long brown hair, big brown eyes, full lashes, and a mouth that was wide and voluptuous.  Leonie thought she was beautiful. 

The girl looked at her.  “Oh, I was lost in thought.”  Her eyelashes scanned Leonie from head to toe, and then she smiled.  “Are you a student at the university?”

“Yes, I am.  I’m on a field trip with my Spanish professor.  This is the last week of classes, and we’re touring around Buenos Aires to learn more about the Argentine culture.  May I ask you why you are here?”

“I’m looking for love,” said the girl, waving her wrist in front of her. 

“I don’t understand,” responded Leonie.

“We have a tradition.  If a girl wants love, she comes to the cathedral and ties a ribbon on a branch of the myrtle tree in the garden, which symbolizes romantic and devoted love.  Soon, she will find a love that will be true and lasting.”

“What a nice tradition.”  Leonie smiled at the girl.

“Did your professor tell you that this church is haunted by its namesake?”

“No. What do you mean?”

“The woman for whom this church was built, Felicia, was murdered.  She was shot in the back by her suitor and died on January 30.  People say that on that day, a woman with a pale face and dark hair, dressed all in white, walks from the garden, opens the door to the church, proceeds down the aisle to the main altar and leaves a trail of tears behind her. 

“That’s such a sad story.”

“Now, Felicia brings love to all the women who request it by tying their ribbons on the myrtle tree.  She has turned her tragedy into positive deeds—bringing love to all women of her beloved city.”

“So, you are going to tie your ribbon on the gate?”

“Yes, to find my love.”

“May I help you?”

“I’d like that. Let’s go.”

The two girls walked out of the church together, smiling and chatting as they went.  Once they reached outside, they walked through the roses in the garden until they reached the myrtle tree.  The brown-eyed girl untied the ribbon from her wrist and, with Leonie’s help, tied it around one of the tree’s branches. 

“Thank you for helping me,” said the girl.  “I believe I will find my love even faster because of your kindness.”

“I was honored to share your dream,” said Leonie. 

“Let’s tie a ribbon on the tree so you can find your love.”

“Oh, I’m not ready for love,” said Leonie.

“That doesn’t matter.  Your love will arrive when you are ready.  Here, I have another ribbon.”  The girl pulled another red ribbon out of her pocket and handed it to Leonie.

Leonie raised her chin back and laughed which sounded like the rise and fall of a musical scale.  “I guess it won’t hurt.”  She chose another branch close to the girl’s ribbon and tied hers around it in a bow.

“I’m happy that you will find love too,” said the girl.  The girl smiled at Leonie, placed her hands on her shoulders, and kissed her lightly on each cheek.  Her eyes shone like topaz.

“I will never forget you,” said the girl, and she walked away, her skirts swishing gently from side to side. 

That night, before Leonie fell asleep, she wrote in her book of affirmations.  She wrote—I provide love to the world.  She looked at the words that she had written and thought about the girl with the full lashes who wanted to find love. 

I must first find out what I want, Leonie thought.  Until I know who I am and what my purpose is, I won’t attract the right kind of love. 

One thing I know.  I know I can provide love to others.  I’ll do this first and then, when the time is right, I’ll let someone love me. 

She turned out the light and dreamt about the myrtle tree and its red ribbons.

Wisdom of the Trees: Chapter 1

Photo by DARIAN PRO on Unsplash

From ancient times, trees have symbolized physical and spiritual nourishment, transformation and liberation.

Chapter 1 – Oak

One more week and she was done.  Graduated with a double major.  College over.  More educated than most of the people on earth. 

And you know what?  She wasn’t going back home, even when this class was over.  Her father had paid for a round trip ticket to Buenos Aires, but she was going to cash it in and stay.

This was her chance to really be independent, to find out what her values were without her father’s advice about this job or that apartment, this guy or that outfit. 

She missed her mother though, but her mother wasn’t at home anyway.  When Leonie was supposed to be having the time of her life in college, her mother had contracted breast cancer.  After three surgeries, six months of chemotherapy that sapped her effervescent energy, and twelve weeks of radiation that burned her skin red, the cancer came back. 

Just before she passed away, Leonie and her mother had sat under the oak tree in the back yard, the shadows of its branches spreading like arms across the grass. 

“I can’t lose you, Mom.”  She had wept beside her mom, the shade of the giant tree darkening her tears like black pearls.

“You won’t feel the same, but you’ll never lose me.  You’ll just have to learn how to live with me differently.” 

Leonie had felt so confused.  She stared at her mother’s face so that she could remember it—her gray-blue eyes, silky skin, a mouth that always held the hint of a smile.  She stared deep into her eyes, holding on, wishing for more time.

“I’ll be with you,” said her mother.  “I’ll guide you from a new place, a place you cannot see, but that is nevertheless powerful.  You’ll feel me.”

Leonie clutched her mother’s hand.

“I want you to find your inner strength.  Emulate this oak tree.  Every time you feel weak or lost, visualize yourself as an oak tree, rising strong, spreading wide, enduring challenge and finding the sun.  You won’t be alone because I’ll be beside you, breathing my love into your heart.”

“But I won’t see you.  You’re my inspiration.  I’ll be lost without you.”

“My love will remain here.  When you can no longer physically see me, you can find other women to inspire you.  Choose many, in fact.  One to follow for leadership skills, another to learn the art of love, and another to learn how to live with joy.  She may be one of your professors, a co-worker, a girl friend, a friend’s mother, or a woman you meet only one time in your life. Whatever you wish to be, you can find a woman to inspire you.”

“How can you be so strong?  You’re dying!”

“I’m content because I know that I will continue my life in another form.  My spirit is not dying.  My soul will continue, and I’ll grow from its future experiences.  I have many things to look forward to.”

Leonie remembered this conversation as she held her mother’s ashes six months later, secured in a pearlescent urn shaped like a heart.  Leonie kissed the top of the urn before placing it in the niche at the cemetery.   “Enjoy your journey, Mom,” she whispered.

Later, as she sat in the back yard next to her mother’s chair, Leonie thought she heard her mother’s voice.  No, maybe it was the breeze rustling the limbs of the oak tree instead. 

“My journey will be right alongside you,” said the breeze.

Staying focused on her studies was impossible after her mother’s death, but her girl friends had helped, and then Leonie decided to go overseas for a change of scenery—a much needed distraction that she needed to survive.

So now, she was in Buenos Aires and hungry.  She lived in a shabby dorm room in the basement of the university and tutored students in English to make money, but it wasn’t enough. 

Leonie searched through her backpack for something to eat: an empty plastic juice bottle, a paper envelope from the bocadillo she had for lunch.  She poked her fingers deeper.  Something waxy.  She grabbed at it and pulled out an apple, a little bruised, but it was food.

The next morning, Leonie woke up with a growling stomach and the sound of traffic.  Engines racing, horns blaring, and brakes squealing invaded her tiny room through the high window that wasn’t even big enough for her to crawl through.  Leonie grabbed her shampoo and towel, opened the door, and paced to the single shower room. 

Whew!  It was empty.  The water felt refreshing on her wet head, rinsing off the humidity and sweat of her body from the sweltering night.

Today, she was going to meet a friend that she had met in her Spanish class.  Clarissa was a native Argentinian and Leonie wanted to ask her about traveling throughout the country. 

Upstairs in the dormitory lobby, a canister of coffee stood on a table next to a large blue box of sweet pastries.  Leonie poured the thick, viscous liquid into her own mug, stuck a pastry between her teeth, and whisked out the door.

Clarissa was sitting at a table in the corner of the café with her laptop open when she arrived.  A cup of mate steamed to the right of her computer, Clarissa wildly typing on the keyboard.

“Hey, how’s it going?” asked Leonie, grabbing the back of the chair opposite her, scraping it across the floor, flinging her backpack over a post, and sitting down.

“Hey,” murmured Clarissa, finishing a sentence.

“You know, this Spanish class is my last college class, and I’ve got to figure out what to do with the rest of my life.  I feel lost without my mother, and I don’t want to go home without a plan.  I don’t even know if I want to live there anymore.”

Clarissa picked up her mate, sipped it, and looked up at Leonie. “I suggest that you travel and meet as many people as possible.  They’ll give you new ideas, and you’ll learn that you have endless options,” said Clarissa.

“That does sound good,” said Leonie.  “How should I start?”

“Just go,” said Clarissa. “Don’t think too much.  Don’t plan too much, but be ready to make your trip work each step of the way.  I’m emailing my sister.  She works at the Belmond Hotel, a few miles from Iguazu Falls.  Maybe she can get you a free room.  Iguazu Falls is one place you should go!”

“Oh, I’m so nervous about traveling by myself.  Maybe I’ll just stay here,” responded Leonie.

“Oh, no you won’t,” said Clarissa. “You’re going, and that’s that.”

“We’ll see,” said Leonie.  I have a whole week of classes left.”

“Yes, a whole week to build up your courage and begin your new life.”

Hidden

Photo by Anton Darius on Unsplash

Sylvia had a secret.  One that rolled around in her stomach like a marble in a maze, bashing against the walls until they bruised, swirling her energy into anxiety.

Sylvia’s friend Ruth told detailed stories about how her mother psychologically abused her during her teenage years.  When they were cleaning out her grandmother’s house after her death, Susan had wanted her grandmother’s wooden chest full of yarn.  Her mother refused to let her have it, and, instead, gave it to Susan’s older sister who didn’t even knit.  Susan wondered for decades why she wasn’t good enough to have such a treasured keepsake and why her mother had favored her sister over her.  Ruth told everyone about the hurts in her background, but she still walked around like a broken doll, permanently damaged, as if nothing could ever erase the scars she had suffered.

When Ruth talked about her feelings, Sylvia flashed her own memories across her mind about how her father had favored her sister over her.  “Isn’t she beautiful,” she remembered he had said.  Sylvia had looked in the mirror countless times wondering why no one ever called her beautiful.  She had clear skin, thick hair, blazing green eyes.  Weren’t green eyes as pretty as blue ones? 

Her friend Paul had told her about how his father was never around.  He never played sports with him, never sat with him on the couch for a game of chess, never even got to his high-school graduation until Paul had already walked across the stage and waved to his mother who was frantically waving back with both hands, as if she was waving for two.  Even today, Paul’s father didn’t act like a father, but like a distant friend who sent him an article once in awhile about a topic that never related to Paul’s life.  Paul had worked hard to build self-confidence, but struggling with a narcissistic father made that an up-and-down journey.

Sylvia’s friend Jen talked about her childhood, too.  She told Sylvia how a sixteen-year-old neighbor boy had raped her when she was eleven, luring her into his backyard shed one afternoon and slowly removing her clothes while he talked to her about the different birds in the garden.  Jen said that it was therapeutic to talk about it after so many years of keeping it hidden.  At first, she was embarrassed that it had happened to her.  What did she do to encourage that boy anyway?  Why did she let him get her into the shed by herself?  Didn’t she know better?  Sylvia didn’t see how Jen had let go of the trauma if she still had all these questions in her mind.

When Jen talked, Sylvia nodded empathetically: “It wasn’t your fault.  He took advantage of you.  He was stronger, and you couldn’t have stopped him.”  Inside her chest, however, Sylvia carefully drew a curtain in front of her own heart, shielding it from the memory of her own secret, stopping her from the minute-by-minute re-enactment of the scene, her shame, her acquiescence, her fear of exposure. 

Sylvia didn’t want her friends to know she had suffered so much, had been irreparably violated.  Maybe someone would use the information about her secret as revenge if they ever got angry at her.  They would expose her in front of people she didn’t trust, and she would endure more embarrassment than she could handle. 

Sylvia had spent years searching for her own self-esteem, her worthiness to be loved, her value as a treasured friend, her worth as an employee, her right to be happy at all.  She thought that she should go talk to someone about her secret so that she could get it off her chest.  Would that even work? 

Finally, she made an appointment with a female minister at a church she did not attend.  She told the woman about her secret, and asked her what she should do to heal from it.  

“First, ask God for forgiveness.  God will forgive anyone, even if you can’t forgive.  Once, you’re comfortable that God has forgiven you, then forgive yourself and anyone else involved.”

Sylvia had worked on forgiving herself and the other person involved for years.  Nevertheless, the memories, surfaced again and again like a nightmare when she least expected them.  Sometimes, she even invited them into her thoughts as if she could purge them out of existence by focusing on them one last final time. 

Nothing stopped the nightmares.  They came while she was sleeping in a vivid stream, and her fear rose incrementally during the dream until she would awaken all of a sudden, gasping for breath like she had been under water the whole time.  Her forehead was drenched with sweat, her heart tight with shame.

Sylvia did feel the pain of her friends, and because she did, she could listen to their stories and offer some solace just by suffering with them.  She also understood the pain that her students told her about. 

Samantha was a student in Sylvia’s college composition class.  Samantha’s mother had kicked her and her three-year-old daughter out of the house, and, now Samantha experienced anxiety that interfered with her performance at school.  Sylvia had counseled Samantha through several episodes of anxiety, and she had passed her English class in spite of her mother.

Van suffered from post-traumatic-stress-syndrome ever since he returned from Iraq, and his significant other left him right in the middle of the semester.  Since Sylvia knew what anxiety and poor self esteem felt like, she coached Van step by step until he, too, passed his writing class.

So many of her community college students needed emotional support in order to pass their classes.  Owen’s father beat him.  Misty lived with five family members in a noisy, two-bedroom apartment.  Monica’s parents wanted her to get married like a dutiful Islam daughter and give up going to school.  Randall had spent two weeks living out of his car during the semester until his uncle let him live in his garage. 

Sylvia knew that if she put in more effort to help these students, they could succeed and improve their lives through education and awareness of other opportunities.  Yet, sometimes, as Sylvia sat beside one student or another, she felt like a broken human being trying to help another broken soul.    

Was it true that people who never felt loved died of heart attacks?  Most mornings, she woke up with a tight chest.  She lay in bed breathing in and out of her nose until her chest relaxed a little, but the tightness never fully went away. 

Most people had a secret, didn’t they?  Weren’t most people walking around, hiding their secrets underneath their shirts, their polite manners, their rudeness, their abusive characters, their anxiety, their bullying, their surrender, and their repeated attempts at survival?

Yes, they were, Sylvia knew.  She was, too.  She had endured so many scars and affronts to her character, yet here she was, carrying her secret around like a satchel of wisdom.

Really, she thought she deserved a medal.

An Old Rose

She was worried about her mother who seemed to struggle to stay present, something pulling her focus away or inward.  Some days she sat in the arm chair by the window, staring straight ahead, her gray-blue eyes lost in deep thoughts. 

When Sestina tried to talk to her, her mother struggled to respond.  “Wait a minute,” she would say, then, with a determined set to her mouth, she’d squeeze her eyes shut for a brief moment, open them wide, and glare at Sestina while she slowly made a lucid response. 

Her mother woke up early every morning, took a spit-bath at the sink in her bathroom, put on her clothes, and combed her golden white curls until she looked neat and ready for an outing.  After breakfast—not a big one mind you—just a piece of bacon and half a piece of toast with butter and strawberry jam—she sat down in the chair by the window and disappeared into her private thoughts.  Her breathing was labored, and she raised her shoulders every time she inhaled, her chest rising slowly, and she exhaled by opening her mouth and releasing a small burst of air.

On Wednesday, while her mother was sitting in her arm chair, Sestina went out to prune the old roses off the rose bushes.  She knew her mother not only loved flowers, but she loved roses most of all, and Sestina wanted the roses to look perfect when her mother looked out the window.   Eight tea rose bushes grew in the redwood planter, a raised bed so that the roses bloomed at the same height as the window.  The planter was about six feet from the window so when her mother looked out, she could see the stems wave gently in the breeze and glow in the sun. 

The yellow rose bush was the heartiest with big blossoms that bloomed like cabbages.  One bush grew lavender roses, medium in size with delicate petals and a hue that took Sestina’s breath away.  Four of the bushes bloomed with various versions of red flowers, each a unique shade of red and shaped petals.  The two white bushes bloomed with the most flowers, always producing plenty of blossoms so that Sestina could cut some and bring them in the house.

Sestina held the kitchen shears in her right hand and pulled back a single stem from a rose bush, looking for the perfect compound leaf of five leaflets so she could prune the dead rose at just the right angle and place to encourage more growth. 

As she made the cut, the daylight intensified into a blaze of light all around her.  Insects’ voices grew loud into a hum like a Gregorian chant, and she heard the wind rush under the wings of a swallowtail butterfly who hovered over a rosebush nearby.  The butterfly glided toward her, waved its wings close to her nose, and she thought that she heard it whisper, it’s time for her, time for her.   Its black face smiled, and its eyes looked deep into hers, speaking wordlessly of love.  She heard the breath of the breeze travel through the petals of each rose, and the scissors snapped the rose’s stem like a clap of thunder.  She heard the leaves of the lemon tree give birth to new cells and buds of fruit.  Then, suddenly, the breaths of the insects and flying creatures, echoes of the growing plants, and pneuma of the wind were silent, and the garden was still.

When Sestina got back to the cottage, she found that her mother had died.   Her face was turned toward the open window and her hands were folded over each other like a final prayer.

Child of Light

That child of mine. 

She was like the black sheep of the family, but that didn’t mean there was anything wrong with her.  On the contrary.  Ever since she was a little girl, she walked like she was floating on air—her feet swishing out from beneath her, her body gliding like a spirit, her head held up and her eyes cast high like she was watching a movie in the sky. 

Little Beth had a heart-shaped face, her blue eyes spaced perfectly apart and framed with blonde eyebrows, her pale rosy cheeks glowing like pink pearls, her plump cherub mouth, and soft chin.  But she was a shy creature and shunned the limelight, so most people didn’t notice her as she peeked into the room around a wall, hid in a corner on a stool, or swung on the swing outside, alone, when the rest of the kids were in the house. 

After Beth turned seven and received her Holy Communion, I walked up behind her to Communion at one Sunday Mass.  When Beth reached the priest, his eyes opened wide as he looked into her face, his hand paused with the wafer above the chalice.  After a frozen moment in time, he said, “The face of God.”

What did he mean?

My daughter stood there with her hands joined together, her fingers pointing to the ceiling like dove wings.  Finally, the priest fluttered his eyes, seeming to compose himself and said, “The body of Christ.”

“Amen,” said Beth, her voice rising like a musical whisper.  She stuck out her tongue and the priest placed the wafer there, then she circled around so I could see her. 

And then I knew.  A spotlight from the ceiling lit up her face, and I saw a glow in her eyes like the sun breaking through the clouds after a rain, radiant globes of love.  A warmth filled my body as she passed me, and I knew from then on that I was extraordinarily blessed to have her in my life. 

The priest’s eyes followed her as she left, and, because he was preoccupied, I also turned around and watched her glide down the aisle like a sail on the breeze.   Quickly, I faced the altar again, but still had to wait for him to recover and remember that more people waited in line for Holy Communion. 

***

My husband and I asked Beth to be the executor of our will.  We asked her because she studied finances in college and we thought she’d be qualified to deal with the mechanics of disbursing our assets. 

Peter died young so he wasn’t around when I started to go blind and I couldn’t write checks, cook on the stove, or drive my car anymore.

Beth told me that it was time that she took care of me.  She helped me move into an assisted living place where three of my friends already lived.  She helped me sort through the sixty years of belongings in my house, found charities to pick up unwanted furniture, hired a gardener to keep the lawn cut until the house could be sold, worked with my realtor, accepted a great offer on the house, and filled my bank account with the money. 

“You have enough money to live for 35 more years,” she told me.  “You saved and scrimped, and now, I’m going to make sure you are treated like a queen.”

I couldn’t see very well, but Beth knew that I could still smell the roses, so every time she came to visit, she brought a dozen roses, a chrysanthemum plant, Easter lilies, Gerber daisies, or an African violet to put on my windowsill. 

I died on a December morning instead of a January afternoon because Beth was beside me in the hospital, making sure that the medical professionals didn’t exceed their zeal in pointlessly extending my life with hoses down my throat, catheters in my neck, and countless blood transfusions. 

She ordered a giant spray of red roses to cover my coffin at the viewing and to decorate my grave after I was buried.  Red roses signify eternal love. 

That child of light of mine. 

Rosie’s Resistance

Photo by Repent of Your Sins & Seek Lord Jesus on Unsplash

“Who gave you the right to run my life?’

Rosie was leaning on the dining room table in her house, sitting with her daughter Claire.  As she asked this question, she leaned her elbow on the table and rested her hand under one cheek.

“Mom, you did,” responded Claire.  Rosie thought Claire looked sad, but determined.  “You and Dad asked me to take care of your trust, and, now, you need someone to take care of you.”

“I’m fine,” Rosie insisted.

“Every day you ask one of your children to come over here to help you with something.  You drop your pills and can’t see to pick them up.  This is a big house.  You need someone to dust, wash floors, vacuum, and even cook for you.  You can’t live here alone anymore.  It’s too dangerous.”

“They can help me.  That’s O.K.”

“Mom, they all have families to take care of.  You said that you didn’t want to be a burden to your children.”

Rosie didn’t answer.  She looked down at the table silently.

“Asking them to come over every day is too much.  This house is big.  Your yard is huge.”

“It doesn’t hurt them to help out,” Rosie responded.

“Mom, now you’re being selfish.  You can move into Sunrise Assisted Living just a mile away.  Three of your good friends live there.”

“I don’t want to.”

“It’s time, Mom.  Think about it and when you want to move.”  Claire wiped her cheek as she turned away, then pursed her mouth into a smile as she turned to look back at her mother.

One year later, Rosie was sitting at the dining room table again, this time with her grand-daughter Leonie.

“I’m sure your apartment will be nice, Grandma.  Don’t worry.”

Claire and her sister were packing clothes into boxes.  Her brothers—Joe, Don, and Ron—were carrying furniture out the door and into the back of Ron’s truck: a double bed, the new red recliner, a dresser, a tiny desk, the T.V. and its stand. 

A few months before, Claire and Rosie had gone to Sunrise Assisted Living and filled out a lease for Rosie’s apartment.  They had lunch, too, and Claire thought it was good.

Today, Claire and her siblings left Rosie at home with Leonie while they set up Rosie’s new apartment.  Minnie was busy arranging Rosie’s clothes in the closet.  Claire made the bed once it was moved in.  Ron hung pictures.  Joe unpacked dishes and put them into the two cupboards in the tiny kitchen.  Don hung up shelves and arranged Rosie’s collection of egg cups on them.  Nobody was smiling.  Everyone had a furrowed forehead and looked as if they were going to cry.

“I’ve got a joke,” said Ron, all of a sudden.

“No jokes today, Ron.  I’m not in the mood,” Claire said.

“No, seriously, you’ll appreciate it.”

“No, we won’t,” said Minnie.

“Come on, I know you will.  It’ll be O.K.”

“Go ahead, Ron, but don’t be surprised if we don’t laugh,” said Claire leaning over a corner of the double bed which she had just covered with a flowered bedspread. 

“I found this on the Internet.  One day, a famous man went to a nursing home to see all of his friends again and see how they were doing. When he got there EVERYBODY greeted him [because, of course, everybody knew him]. One man he noticed didn’t come up to him or say anything to him, so, later, he walked up to the man and asked him ‘Do you know who I am?’ and the old man replied “No, but you can go to the front desk and they’ll tell you.’”

Claire was sitting on the floor next to the bed.  She rolled over and held her stomach as her laughter erupted.  Minnie stopped sorting the clothes in the closet, turned to look at Ron, and made a loud, long musical chuckle.  Joe stopped unpacking dishes and guffawed.  Don stopped arranging egg cups, smirked, and exploded into a happy groan. 

But Ron laughed most of all.  His big frame started jiggling first.  He opened his mouth wide, showing his perfect white teeth, and a deep, cascading huh-huh-huh-huh-huh sprang into the room, reverberating off the four walls and enveloping his sibling audience. 

Everyone expelled their laughter like a long exhale, then grew silent and looked at each other.

“O.K. That was funny,” said Claire.  “You’re so good at bringing out the humor, Ron.”

They worked for three hours, setting up picture frames on the wide window sill, arranging a bouquet of flowers on the dresser, placing the T.V. remote next to the tiny side table beside the recliner.  They plugged the beside lamps into the outlets, set the digital clock with the huge numbers, hung the towels in the bathroom, and arranged the soap and lotion on the bathroom counter. 

Soon the studio was perfectly arranged in its décor of pinks and greens.  The blinds of the window let in the afternoon sunshine, and the window was open to allow the autumn breeze to filter into the room.

Claire and Minnie drove back to Rosie’s house to pick her up.  When they got there, Leonie and Rosie were still sitting at the dining room table.  Rosie fidgeted with her hands and Leonie looked up with worry in her eyes.

“Your beautiful studio is ready, Mom,” said Minnie, putting on a smile.

The three girls drove Rosie to Sunrise.  They guided her through the front lounge.  On one side, other residents watched T.V. in a common room.  The lounge had an autumn wreath over the front arch.  They pushed the button on the elevator while talking to the assistant at the front desk.  They took her arm and guided her down the hall to her studio, and then opened the door.

Rosie stepped into the room.   She walked through the tiny kitchen, past the bathroom, and into the conjoined bedroom and living area.  Her head swiveled from side to side, surveying the bed and its bedspread, the digital clock, the lamps, the recliner, the window sill with all its pictures, the dresser with the vase of chrysanthemums, the T.V. stand, and the tiny desk with its statue of Mary and cup of pens.  Then her head swiveled up and back to inspect the egg cup shelves, the collection of spoons, the large family picture of her and her children, the trees through the window, her wedding photo, and the metal picture of The Last Supper.   Finally, a small, almost imperceptible sound escaped from her lips—a cross between approval and satisfaction.

Her children and grand-daughter guided her to the recliner and helped her sit down Claire sat down on the floor to her left. Minnie knelt down right in front of her. Ron sat on the bed and stretched his tree trunk legs out in front of him. Leonie sat next to her mother Claire, and Joe and Don sat on the floor on Rosie’s right and leaned their backs against the wall under the window. Rosie looked down at them all and her eyes shone as blue as a California sky.

The Imagination Grandpa Story 1: The Clock Man’s Wise Clocks

Photo by Ella de Kross on Unsplash

Instead of going to Third Grade, Rosie was in a hospital bed with tubes connected all over her body.  Rosie’s heart had a problem and the doctors took her into an operating room one day to fix it.  Now, she had to lie down in bed all the time, and she couldn’t play.

The day after the operation, Grandpa Joy came in to visit Rosie.  He wore his blue jean jacket that had lots of pockets.  When he came in the door, he took off his beret and placed it on the table beside Rosie’s bed. 

“Should I tell you a story?” he asked.

“O.K.” said Rosie.  She was so bored just lying in bed. 

Grandpa started his story. 

Once upon a time, an old man owned a clock shop.  The shop was a huge room, and clocks covered every inch of the four walls.  He had clocks with black hands, silver hands, gold hands, and bronze hands.  Some clocks had round faces with 12 birds to mark the numbers.  Some clocks were carved out of wood with long pendulums hanging from the clock faces all the way to the bottom of the cases.  On one wall, a whole line of coocoo clocks hung silently, their birds frozen in various stages of entering or leaving through the coocoo doors. 

In the middle of the great room, large trunks were propped on their sides, and, against these great boxes, grandfather and grandmother clocks leaned silently.  No ticking escaped from their chambers because all the them were broken. 

In fact, all of the clocks in the whole store were broken and quiet.  The only noise in the vast room was the scratching from a mouse family that lived inside one of the walls and came out whenever the old man dropped crumbs and bits of cheese from his sandwiches.

One day, a young man came in to buy a clock.  He smiled at the old clock seller when he opened the creaking door and walked right up to the counter.  This young man wanted a clock to give to his wife for her birthday

“What kind of clock should I buy for my wife?” the young man asked. 

“Well, a grandmother clock might be nice,” said the old man.  I have several of them leaning against these big trunks.  Which one do you like?”

The young man hemmed and hawed.  He tucked his first under his chin and looked at the clocks with big eyes.  He peered into the clocks’ faces, and inspected inside the glass doors that held the pendulums. 

“I like this one,” the smiling man said.  “but it doesn’t seem to be working.”

“All of these clocks are broken,” said the old man.  “I get them from people who no longer want to fix them, and I save them until someone new comes along that will appreciate them.  Some of these clocks are over a hundred years old.  When someone wants to buy one, I fix it until it works perfectly again.”

“Is an old clock be better than a new one?” asked the young man.

“I’d say so,” said the clock man.  “Old clocks have seen so many years go by.  They’ve watched girls and boys fall in love, lovers get married, babies being born, Christmases and Easters and Passovers celebrated.  And as they’ve watched these stories, they’ve saved these memories as wisdom to pass onto their next owners.  A new clock is just a metal face or a wooden box, but an old clock is a treasure chest of life.”

The smiling man stood in thought for a long minute, and then looked straight into the clock man’s face.  “Well, someday my wife and I would like to have a family, and we’re going to need a lot of wisdom when we do.” 

He peered again into the Grandmother clock standing next to him.  Her face shone like mother-of-pearl and the numerals glistened in the tiny spotlights that hung from the ceiling.  The face was set into a rosewood box and the rose-bronze pendulum matched the numerals.

“I’ll take this one,” said the smiling man.  “My wife will not only love how beautiful it is, but she’ll also love the stories that come with it.”

So the clock man fixed the clock.  He bought new wheels and whirs and inserted them behind the face so that the hands of the clock started moving and the pendulum swung gently from side to side.  He rubbed the face until it shone like a pearl and the rosewood until it gleamed like a shiny chestnut, and he cleaned and dusted every part inside and out.  One week later, the clock was ready.

The next day, the smiling man came into the shop.  With him, he brought a pile of blankets.  He looked around for his clock and his eyes found it standing under a single spotlight, glistening like a mermaid in the sun.

“My wife is going to be so happy,” the smiling man said.  “I can’t wait to get this home.”

The two men helped each other wrap a small blanket around the pendulum inside the clock case.  They covered the outside of the clock with more blankets and tucked the blankets securely so the clock wouldn’t get broken.  Then the smiling man paid for the clock and carried it out the door, his eyes shining like buttons. 

For a whole year, the clock man ate his sandwiches inside his clock shop where only his silent clocks kept him company.  Every day, he dropped crumbs and cheese bits from his sandwiches, and the mouse family darted into the room to pick them up, then rushed back to the hole in the wall. 

People came in to give him their old clocks, and other people came in to buy one of the broken clocks.  The man worked hard to make the clock customers happy, but he was lonely.

Then one day, the smiling man opened the creaking door and stood back.  Inside walked a young smiling woman holding a baby in her arms.  The smiling man walked in behind her.

“I want you to meet my family,” said the smiling man.  “This is my wife Sharon and my new daughter Rosie.”

The old man was so surprised that, at first, he couldn’t speak.  He just stood by the counter and opened and closed his mouth like a goldfish for several long seconds.

“I’m so happy to meet you,” he finally uttered.  “Did you like your birthday present?”

“Oh, yes!” replied Sharon.  “My birthday clock is so beautiful that it inspired me to name our new daughter Rosie, like the beautiful rosewood and the mother-of-pearl face.”

The clock man beamed like a shiny copper penny.

“You were right about old clocks,” said the smiling man.  “Sharon’s clock not only inspired us to name our daughter, but it also reminds us to sing every hour, and that makes us happy.”

The old man’s face lit up like a flashlight.

“Would you mind if we visited you once a week so that Rosie gets to know you and learns about your shop of wise clocks.

The clock man looked around his clock shop as if he had never really looked at it before. These clocks were all potential friends, he thought. Then he looked back at the rosewood clock family and knew then that he’d never feel lonely again.

Grandpa was finished with his story, and Rosie looked up at him with shining eyes.

“That was a wonderful story, Grandpa,” she said.  “That baby had the same name as me?  Was it a true story?”

“No, Rosie.  I used my imagination to make it up.  Of course, the idea for the story is true.”

“What do you mean Grandpa?”

“Well, I wanted to tell you a story that started with you, and so I told my imagination to use your name to invent one.”

“Oh, I like that Grandpa.  That makes me happy.”

The Grandpa kissed Rosie’s cheek and tucked her blankets around her.  “When I come back tomorrow, I’ll tell you another story,” he said.  “Meanwhile, you can use your imagination to keep you company until your next visitor comes.”

“O.K. Grandpa.”  Rosie snuggled into her blankets and feel asleep a few minutes later, her face glowing . . .

Where the Spirit Is

Photo by nine koepfer on Unsplash

Ten years ago, the twenty-two-year-old son of a dear friend of mine died.  He was a junior at U.C. Davis and had just attended dance lessons the night before he died.  Alex also was intelligent, kind, and thoughtful, and full of an essence that made his face glow.

Six years ago, I went to a memorial for the twenty-five-year-old son some other dear friends of mine.  Max died while he was teaching English in Cambodia.  He was a spiritual, thoughtful, charitable, and intelligent young man.  On his last day, he had helped some friends rebuild their house after a storm.

What sense can be found in these losses?  How can such young people die before they have lived long enough to have children of their own?  How can parents endure the loss of a child?  It seems impossible to figure out the meaning of life when some lives end so early and abruptly.

At church one day, the priest told the congregation that the Hebrew word for spirit “ruach” also means “breath.”  When I heard this, I first thought that it meant that the spirit was alive as long as a person was breathing.  When the breath stopped, the spirit ceased.

But I kept thinking about this.  I know people that have died.  My dad died nine years ago and he is still alive in my life.  I breath thoughts about him or like him or with him at least once a week.  My friend Leona died even longer ago, and I still laugh every time I get lost because she and I got lost all the time.  We never worried because it was so much fun and we were too busy laughing.

My friend Henry died ten years ago.  Henry had lung cancer but he had also a heart attack while walking down the street.  When they put him on life support in the hospital, he registered as brain dead, and eventually died from organ failure.  As I sat next to him in the hospital for three weeks, I slowly realized that it was his time to go and nothing was going to stop him.

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Now Henry lives for me in the pearly gold sunshine that bathes the granite face of Half Dome in Yosemite.  On spring afternoons, he walks with me up the mountain path behind my house where the wild flowers meet the even blue sky.  He fills my eyes with memories as I plant new flowers in my back yard.

My mother died last month. I remember her reading to me when I was a tiny, little girl. We sat on the edge of my bed, and her voice brought words to my life for the first time. She bought me pastries when I took the bus with her to the market on Saturdays. I still feel the greasy warmth of these pastries in my hands, and I think of those moments whenever I eat pastries today. During the last year before she died, she called me at least once a week to tell me she loved both me and my husband, Bob. I wondered, at the time, if she had experienced a spiritual enlightenment that instructed her to end her legacy of motherhood with the three most important words a mother could ever say to a child. In fact, the last three words she said to me were “I love you.”

These days, my mother doesn’t appear to me like a bird or a butterfly. I just feel the brush of her arm alongside mine as I go about my daily tasks and find out how to live a life without her pillar in the background. I turn to my phone to call her, and, then, I remember that her new phone number is “unlisted.”

So, what about these young people?  Will they live on like my dad, mom, Leona, and Henry, but come back in a different form?  Has their spirit been transformed from “breath” into something else?

I think these souls have something new to do.  I suspect that they were more evolved than I am and they had already achieved all they needed on this level of existence.  And if this is true, then I am happy that they got promoted.  Nothing is worse than being stuck in a dead-end job where you can already perform every task both forwards and backwards, and you’re yearning for a new experience.

Maybe the meaning of life is that life does have meaning.  Maybe it’s not important that we know where the spirit goes after life, but that we think about where the spirit is while we’re here, while we can sense the “ruach” through every breath.

Surely, the breath is tangible evidence and a good enough reminder that our spirit is alive and well.  I’m grateful for this because I often get caught up in less important details that don’t matter to anyone or anything, except to me for a brief, particular moment.  I need a reminder, like the habitual ticking of a clock or the consistent in and out of my breath to keep me balanced and focused.

But the souls that have stopped breathing don’t need the practice of yoga or any other rituals.  They don’t need the same constant reminders to stay focused on the essential essence of their purpose.  Now, I bet they’re working with a higher form of contemplation.

They make me a little jealous, and a lot inspired.

What should I do? Just what I now am doing. Focus on my “ruach” and make sure that my life has meaning. I’m not alone, after all. I have all of my beloved spirits brushing my arm.