My in-laws home was so much more than just any-old-house.
Designed and built by my father-in-law, Bill, their retirement home rests upon over 50 acres of land on the banks of Lake Mattamuskeet, a National Wildlife Refuge found 30 miles from the nearest stop light.
The land is full of migratory birds, black bears, and deer, to name a few. Rich, black soil supports vibrant family-owned farmland as far as the eye can see.
My mother-in-law, Betty, grew up in her grandmother’s house next door. They didn’t have electricity until she was 12 years old and used a horse before they purchased a car.
Bill was raised with his large family across the Lake. Ten years apart in age, they met shortly after Betty graduated from high school and the rest is history.
They moved to Chesapeake, VA to give their four children more opportunities and moved right back to retire in Fairfield the second my husband graduated high school more than 30 years ago.
Bill passed away in the home when our oldest, Aurora, was only 4 months old. Betty has remained, ever since.
Yes, this house and its land was so much more than any-old home.
It’s where our little family spent every single Easter and Thanksgiving.
This is where our girls picked figs, peaches and pears in the Summer and grapes, apples and pecans in the Fall.
This is where they learned to ride a 3-wheeler, shoot a gun, and befriend a domesticated deer named Jane Doe.
This is the place my children bottle fed lambs and calves, where we roasted oysters over open fire and dyed easter eggs.
Fairfield Methodist Church is where all four of our girls were baptized. It’s where they listened to their Granny play the piano and received treats for the children’s sermon.
When I close my eyes, I feel the soft wind brush my hair. The air is filled with the scent of ripe figs so visceral, I can taste them. I hear the crunch of the pecan hulls underneath my feet and soak in the stunning sunset over the pier my husband built in the lake.
Yes, this home is more than just any-old-house.
It’s a symphony of senses.
It’s a holder of some of our family’s most precious memories that we will carry with us for a lifetime.
“You need to tell her. You need to get into your car right now, go over there and tell her.” my husband encouraged.
It was the eve of my birthday. We were on our front porch and I had just read aloud a letter I’d found while cleaning out my father’s condo. Apparently, he had kept a file for each of his children. In mine I found every report card, parent/teacher conference record and a collection of letters.
What a treasure trove of memories this was for me to dive deeply into.
But the one dated December 11, 1987 left me breathless.
If you’ve followed my blog, then you know the story of my beginning. I am the illegitimate love- child of a long-term affair. My parents worked together but no one suspected, not even after I was born. My older sisters, who also worked with my parents, knew me as “Pam’s daughter” but did not learn I was their half-sister until I was three.
My mother was a powerful business woman. She was charismatic, magnetic, and inspiring. She meant much to many across the entire country but it was me, who wanted her attention the most.
I spent so many years of my life resentful and angry for the time she’d spent building her career in place of a closer relationship with me. Now that I have a daughter very similar to me, when I was a child, I understand how challenging it must have been to forge that relationship. I didn’t make it easy.
I finished this letter and instantaneously, my anger evaporated leaving nothing but remorse in its wake.
I desperately wanted to call her and tell her how sorry I was for failing to recognize the love she had held for me my entire life. I was so busy focusing on her shortcomings that, as a result, I completely missed her devotion and steadfast love.
My mother advocated for me. She encouraged my father to maintain a relationship with me not just in this letter but in other letters I found in the file: inviting him to conferences, recording my thoughts to him pen-to-paper when I could not yet write.
How could I ever thank her enough for that gift? The gift of the presence of my father?
What if I had found this after her death and had never apologized?
What if my father hadn’t kept these letters for me to one day find?
But he did and she’s still here and my husband willed me to go to her.
I couldn’t get a hold of her until the next day but when she answered, I started by telling her how much I loved her followed immediately by how sorry I was for remaining angry with her for so long. I thanked her for loving me anyway, in spite of my anger. For never giving up on me. Not then and not now.
Lately, I’ve started to visualize my life as a river.
She’s a real beaut.
Surrounded by tall trees and mountains. She curves through forests, banked by shady trees; winding through cities, carrying on as rapids to more peaceful pastures.
My river began as a stream and has gained confidence and power along the way.
There have been moments when my river stalled. She was curious, exploring a side cove.
Sometimes, she got stuck in a whirlpool.
Round-and-round she went until she forgot not only where she came from but also where she was going.
Finally, a particularly dreadful downpour left her overflowing back to her main stream whereupon she realized, with great relief, that the whirlpool wasn’t her final destination.
“Dying on your couch while watching TV by yourself is a tragedy. Dying while doing something you love with every part of your body is magic. I wish you magic.”*
The entire premise of my New Leaf Parenting blog is that “Every Day is a Fresh Start”. There’s a lesson to be found in every great or minute facet of life.
But sometimes there is tragedy.
As humans, I believe we are built to persevere, to overcome, even in the darkest of times. Surely survivors of The Holocaust and modern atrocities have taught us that. If they survived, we must.
The truth is, the wind was knocked out of my lungs when my friend called to tell me she had discovered that our pet died the morning after we had left for our longest-ever 10 day vacation.
He was “just a rabbit”. Not a human, not a dog or cat. Just a rabbit that happened to be my first pet since losing my precious dog to a rattlesnake bite when I was 12 years old.
He was our first family pet, purchased at the beginning of the pandemic when we decided to homeschool our four daughters then ages, 2, 4, 6 and 8.
We called him our “therapy rabbit” because he was forever patient- if the girls were loud, he would form into a “loaf”, blocking out the obnoxious sound. When the girls were sad, he would recline next to them, offering unlimited pets. They would nuzzle their face into his and he accepted their grief without question.
He was my morning coffee buddy and my late-night snuggler.
He died because he escaped his enclosure, unnoticed before we left town. Our last security video shows me and my husband ensuring his safe keeping but unbeknownst to us, he made his escape and met his end by another animal that night.
I lie awake, thinking about his tragic, painful, lonely end. Was he scared? Did he feel betrayed by us for leaving town?
He was so good to us, he deserved better.
But then I read fiction to escape reality and come across quotes like the one above and I wonder, did he know we were leaving?
Did he leave before he was left? Not knowing the dangers that lurked in the darkness?
Sometimes there is tragedy and no good lesson to be found.
But I think I’ll sleep better if I believe Oreo died rebelling, refusing to be domesticated a day longer.
I think I’ll sleep better if I believe in magic.
I wish you magic.
* Napolitano, Anne. Dear Edward. New York. Random House. 2020.
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