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| Saturday morning - La Sirena still watching over her |
Her life with my father was not easy. In short......he was a horrible person. By the time I turned 13, they were divorced and I was living with my grandmother (his mother) and my step-grandfather in Houston. When I turned 16, my mother was remarried - came to Houston and amazingly.....in one morning long court hearing - my mother was given full custody of myself and my 2 younger brothers. My father flew into an outrage and was restrained in the courtroom. We hid out in Houston for 2 days before arrangements could be made to fly all of us back to Montana, back to a very small farming community and a home with my new step-father. That year I went from several hundred classmates at South Houston High School to start my Jr. year with 18 classmates total. The first week of my senior year, my step-father left us - our dog broke his leg - our house caught on fire and we had to move to another smaller house just a street over from where we lived. Despite all that I graduated with all my classmates and 2 days later flew to Oklahoma and spent the summer traveling with "custom cutters" who went from state to state, from Oklahoma to Montana, with trucks and combines cutting the wheat and barley harvests.
By Sept 1971, I was back in my little hometown of Dutton. When the harvest season ended and everyone I had come to love and live with the whole summer left and returned to Oklahoma - it was time to make some grown up decisions. I was back in my mother's house for 2 days before I moved out and left for the big city. I was enrolled in a business school and within a short time began a work study program working on the same Air Force Base - Malmstrom - that years before was the place most of the domestic violence of my life occurred. Now I was 18, had a great job and went of with my life.
The day after I turned 22, I was married and that very night.......left Montana for California with my new husband.
My mom. To be honest - I hardly knew her. I remember very little of my life with her. I don't recall many happy times or holidays. I have no recollection of shopping or doing anything for that matter with just her. When she came back into my life when I was 16, I had my own life and there was nothing to do together in such a small town. Most of my clothes were hand me downs so no shopping trips then either. When I left home, she moved further north and I seldom made the 2 hour trip to visit her - she never once visited me. By the time I was married she was with another man who did not like California and in all the years I was there - with 3 of her grandchildren - I remember her visiting less than 5 times.
In 2000 - I arranged a trip for the two of us - to visit my only living brother and his family in Tennessee. My younger brother had killed himself several years prior when he was 29. My step-grandfather moved to Kentucky after my grandmother died and this trip was to see all of them. The trip was only a week - however, it was then I learned my mother had Alzheimer's. At that point she had not been diagnosed but the signs were obvious. In the years that came afterwards, I would make a number of trips to her home in New Mexico to make sure she was taken care of, in 2006 she was placed in an Alzheimer's facility in New Mexico because the state would cover the expenses.
OK - So why all this dreary history??? Because Saturday was my mother's birthday and after she died in Sept 2008 - I had her ashes sent to California. In October of that year, I brought them here to Costa Rica in checked luggage! They sat on my counter top in my small cabina for months until I decided to make a trip to Texas in April 2009, to re-connect with my past. My step-grandfather was now back in San Antonio and the house my mother grew up in was still in Sealy. Her parents - the father who raised her and passed away when I was 8, and her mother who died when my mom was just 9 months old are still in the local Sealy Cemetery. I wanted to visit all these places. This trip was monumental on many different levels. The point is, when I returned to EO after this trip I was ready to let go of my mom.
It was a beautiful morning here in Esterillos - 7 am low tide. I took the box and headed down the hill to La Sirena. It was a weekday - no one on the beach. I picked a number of amapola red flowers and carried them out in a small plastic bag with the ashes in the box. I hadn't really considered just where I would place them but once I got to the mermaid I looked out over the reef infront of her and decided to go out further. About half way out before the ocean touched the rocks I saw a small pool. I placed the flowers on the rocks all the way around. Until this very moment I had not actually seen the ashes and for just a moment considered.......this was my mom. I knelt down because I didn't want the ashes flying all over. There was very little wind but I was still concerned. As the ashes began falling into the pool an amazing thing happened - they turned white! Because the beach here is dark sand instead of the beautiful golden color where I came from in California, the contrast of the light gray and the dark made the ashes look creamy.
I remember standing back - the flowers, the beautiful color of the ashes, la sirena looking out over us..........The moment could not have been more perfect.
Afterwards.....I walked and I walked. I went past the estuary - almost to Monterey in Esterillos Este. The morning was beautiful and again....perfect. I remember stopping and visiting with a number of friends on the way back and then got caught up in my life here. It was shortly after noon when I decided to head back up the beach - go pass La Sirena before I went up the hill. It hadn't occurred to me until I saw them.....the red flowers strewn all along the edge of the tide coming in. I sat there on a log for awhile believing she was out there - watching over all this and pleased with the decision I had made to bring her so far from everything she knew.
Every year on her birthday I walk out to La Sirena specifically to spend some time with my mom. There have been moments when I have been sitting on my surfboard just a short distance for where she was placed and I will connect with her. Each time I have been to the pool - it has been special time together. However, this year was different. This year her birthday was Saturday. It was a very cloudy day. With all the rain, the reef is covered with moss and slippery plus there were other people out there. The welder was supposed to be here but something came up the night before and he had to go to San Jose. I was disturbed by that and the fact there were people climbing around her while I was there - plus - I had forgotten the flowers and didn't want to make the dangerous trip out again. My one and only day.......and it was gone.
The photo of the house is the one my grandfather built in Sealy when my mom was 2 years old. This is where she lived until she left for New Mexico with my dad. I have no photographs of her here in Costa Rica.
Mothers and Daughters. I had brothers and only sons. My one window of opportunity to share my life with a related female passed without me knowing or understanding such a relationship. However, my life is not over - the possibility of a grand-daughter exists but for the moment, that is not on the horizon either.
I apologize to those of you who look to this blog for news and photos of Esterillos. My life is deeply rooted here and with that brings not just the fun stuff, but my own personal life and the ties I have to this community that go beyond the obvious beauty and wonder of this amazing place.
Pura Vida
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