WordSisters

Category: Reflection

  • Escape To El Paredon

    Escape To El Paredon

    Sunset, El Paredon

    “I could live here,” Crystel said. Her arms were spread wide embracing the whole of Guatemala, her birth country.

    Standing on the restaurant rooftop, we breathed in deeply the fresh crisp air. It was a noticeable difference from the air quality in Minnesota currently suffocating from Canada’s wildfires.

    Mountains, hills, and the conical peak of Volcan Santa Maria stretched across the horizon. Church steeples poked up around the valley. Pigeon’s cooing, roosters crowing, and dogs barking punctuated the afternoon. Mayans in colorful dress walked easily up and down the narrow steep cobblestone streets.

    I recognized the little park where we had enjoyed the sun’s rays before entering the restaurant. Flags flowed gently in the breeze above the two cement benches. The park would become our landmark. Left to our Spanish school, right to the restaurant and down the hill to our homestay.

    “Me and Mama Jody feel the same way when we are around Lake Atitlan,” I reminded her. On many occasions Jody and I discussed buying property around the lake and looked at homes for sale. Surrounded by mountains, volcanoes, and water, Lake Atitlan was our sanctuary. Cradled by the universe, the heart of the mother, we felt loved, protected and at peace.

    Eventually, Crystel and I made our way back to our homestay for dinner at 7 pm. Within days we had established a pattern: breakfast with the family, language school, return for lunch, fitness center, afternoon café for hours of reading and writing, finally head back for dinner and lastly bedtime.

    Sidewalks, Xela

    Crystel was our de facto leader. I was content to follow her on the uneven and unpredictable sidewalks that were not wide enough for two people to walk side by side. She helped with bank business and researched cafes, restaurants, and excursions. I gave up any semblance of being in charge. On occasion when I did assert myself and speak on her behalf, she let me know that it wasn’t wanted. I was to be her companion on this trip, the friend who had inferior language skills and was inept at GPS. I was comfortable to step aside and allow her caretaking. It was a gift to be her mother, a speck on the wall, and observe her engagement with others, be fully in the moment, and witness her desire to learn.

    “It’s right here,” Crystel said. She stopped at a pistachio-colored building front with a tan door.

    Entrance to our homestay was through a dimly lit garage. A motorcycle with parts and tires strewn about rested against a cement wall. Broken dusty chairs stacked in a corner. Drywall and crumbled brick swept in a pile. Oil cans, assorted tools, and dog dishes near the rickety steps that climbed to the roof. At times dried dog poo could be spotted. Once I very carefully climbed the stairs to the roof to see if I could escape to a sunlit area to read and write only to be disappointed. Discarded items, unused pot plants, and cement blocks held sheets of tin in place.

    “Mama Beth,” Crystel whispered. I opened my door. “What’s that?” she gestured.

    Beth and Crystel, El Paredon

    I loved it when she visited me, searched me out. We had an easiness about us. Could provide each other company without talking. I sniffed back a sob. On my bed was a piece of sheet rock and plaster dust. “It must of fell from the ceiling or wall.” Sitting with my legs dangling over the bed my back ached from the strain. The mess wasn’t there when we left after lunch for our afternoon workout and café outing.

    Crystel wanted to laugh. It is what we have both done to relieve tension. She thought better of it after seeing my face. My eyes were red from crying. My face flushed.

    “I just finished talking with Mama Jody. I’m so depressed. The clutter and dirt really get to me.” I pointed to the corner of my room and the top of my console. More plaster dust, more debris.

    I brushed off my bed. Crystel climbed in with her book.

    “Now, I’m worried about bed bugs and fleas. Any time I see a spot on my pillowcase or bedding, I put a finger by it to see if it will jump.”

    At dinnertime, Ms. Amsterdam told Crystel that she would not pet the dog if it were her. “The dog has fleas,” she said. Crystel’s hand sprung from the little white friendly dog. “I have flea bites on my ankles because I let the dog in my room.” Mr. England added that there were bed bugs in the mattresses.

    Crystel stiffened. “I like it here,” she said. “The food is good. The family is nice.”

    “I agree. The food is simple and wonderful. I never have to spice anything. The portions are just the right size.” I shifted to lean my back against the headboard. “I hear you laughing and using your Spanish. You could have done this trip by yourself. Did you hear Ms. Amsterdam say that another student looked at my room and then left? She said she couldn’t do it.”

    What is my purpose in all this? This trip was for her. It was supposed to be about her growth. Her lessons. Not mine. What is the meaning here?

     I sensed that Crystel didn’t want to move from our homestay. She could be imagining how it might be to live with her birth family.

    My PTSD was triggered our first night at the homestay. I hadn’t been able to shake it. It took me some time to figure out why I was on heightened alert and couldn’t sleep. It occurred to me that it was about the mess and the chaos that I grew up in. As a teenager, anxiety built inside me until I exploded and got on my hands and knees and scrubbed our kitchen and hallway floors bit by bit. I’d start at my parents’ bedroom, move backwards to my sister’s, then mine, change water and start again in the kitchen area. A table knife in my soapy pail of water was to get what the scratch pad wouldn’t.

    Chaos meant no one was in charge. If no one was in charge, I wouldn’t be safe. At any minute things could spiral out of control. If I could just clean the house, I’d be safe. My parents were of no help. I had long become the surrogate parent to my younger siblings.

    I breathed deeply. “We are leaving for El Paredon on Friday,” I said. “Maybe a long weekend away will be just what I need to reset.”

     I can do this. It’s not that bad. I don’t want to hurt the family’s feelings by leaving. I don’t want to take money away from them. They counted on us. Crystel is doing great. Fitting right in with this Guatemalan family. I can do this. It’s not so bad.

    El Paredon, Surfing

    El Paredon, a remote surf beach town on the Pacific Coast of Guatemala with a black sand beach was on Crystel’s must-do list. She had learned how to surf in Hawaii and wanted to visit surfing destinations. Maybe at El Paredon, I’d find my epiphany. Sunrises and sunsets were known to be spectacular. I imagined relaxing on a sunny beach and enjoying the outdoor hotel pool, lounging, healing, and napping. Crisp clean white bed linen and towels. Fluffed up pillows. A TV to scroll in the evenings. A private bathroom with a warm shower. Falling asleep to the sound of the ocean.

    Before leaving for our long weekend, I folded the blankets on my bed. Removed my sheets and pillowcases. Set them by the washing machine.

     

  • Write Anyway

    Every birthday I consider what the past year has brought and what I hope the upcoming year will bring. This year as I entered a new decade, my focus was also tempered by the awareness that my time isn’t unlimited, and I want to use it well. What will the coming days and years consist of? Family and friends, health upkeep, travel, fun and for me, writing. 

    At first, asking what role writing will play in my life seems silly. Creative writing isn’t something you have to retire from. I can write as long as the words and ideas come. But the deeper question is—What are my expectations about publication?

    Widely published authors like Stephen King and Joyce Carol Oates can continue publishing as long as they care to. It’s a different matter for the writers I know, who have a modest number of publications. Like it or not, the marketplace may decide for them. Because it’s a personal and potentially painful decision, writers don’t always discuss the dilemma.

    In the past 20 years, I’ve written two book-length memoirs, but I’m not seeking publication for either of them. I learned what I could about writing books, but it wasn’t enough. The real gift is what I discovered about myself through the writing process. I’m proud of myself for doing the work. I’m at peace with the idea the books won’t be out in the big world. 

    Instead, I’m focusing on writing short memoirs, essays and blogs. My talents and skills are better suited to short pieces. Most years I publish one or two. Not a breath-taking record, but enough for me. Knowing my words and ideas find an audience in an anthology, literary journal or blog is plenty. 

    Publication plays a small part in my commitment to writing. I write because it helps me make sense of my world.

    Two quotes sum up my outlook. The first comes from a blog by Amy Grier who was struggling with her writing and the state of the world in November 2020. Her thoughts are still relevant:

    “Writing tethers me to the world in a way nothing else does . . . I don’t know who will be president, what’s happening to my country, even what will happen to me. But I’m going to write anyway. It’s my remedy for despair. It’s how I will survive.”

    The next comes from an interview with Margaret Atwood, who offered a few rules for writers. After making practical writerly suggestions, she also said this:

    “Nobody is making you do this: you chose it, so don’t whine.”

    For as long as it pleases me I will honor my creative nature and write anyway.

  • Holding the Lantern High

    When I first suggested that the WordSisters should road trip to Michigan in Beth’s still-a-dream motorhome, I didn’t really think it would happen. But now, more than a year later, I pull into the campground five miles from my new home in Michigan to see Beth sunbathing in front of a 28’ Winnebago. With the help of her wife, Jody, they’ve driven 10 hours from Minneapolis to visit me in tiny Byron Center, Michigan. Soon Ellen and Brenda emerge from the rig and I’m near tears. They’re here. They’re really here. The power of a 20+ year friendship is made manifest.

    L: Sunbathing, R: Beth & Jody

    A lot has happened over the two decades that we’ve known one another (no one can say precisely when we first met). I came to the writing group last (as I remember, but it might have been Brenda). There were other writers in the group then, friends and fellow writers who went their separate ways over time until the four of us remain, bonded by the love of writing, a mutual respect for the craft, and compassion for one another’s lives. We’re no longer just writing group acquaintances, but friends. Through our writing we’ve exposed ourselves to one another in ways we don’t to others. 

    A lot has happened, too, since that day in May 2023 when the idea of a road trip first took root. My husband and I emotionally dismantled three decades of living in our Minnesota home to move to a townhome in my home state. Ellen became a grandmother. Brenda’s daughter (who we met when she was an infant) successfully navigated her first year of high school. And Beth and Jody bought a motor home, which now sits before me in all its glory.

    During the past year I also read Tom Lake (stay with me here) and had the privilege of seeing Ann Patchett at the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota, talk about the book, writing, and life with Kerri Miller for MPR’s Talking Volumes Series. At the end of the night, Miller surprised the audience by bringing Kate DiCamillo on stage. For a group of writers and readers, a surprise visit by the hometown star was, I suspect, the same feeling that music fans had back in the day when Prince used to show up unexpectedly at First Avenue. The crowd roared.

    The dedication to Tom Lake reads: “To Kate DiCamillo who held the lantern high.” Patchett explained that while writing the book she and DiCamillo would exchange a short email in the morning and again at night. “She would always say, ‘I’m going down the rabbit hole. Good luck in the orchard today,’ and at the end of the day she would say, ‘It’s time to come out of the orchard. I’m holding the lantern up. Just walk towards the light.’ ” 

    I sat in the balcony of the Fitzgerald next to my book club members (another group of wonderful women I’ve known for over 15 years) and fought back tears. All I could think of then were Ellen, Beth, and Brenda standing at the edge of my proverbial orchard for two decades guiding me with their light. It’s who we are and what we do for one another as writers. So, on the last night of our way-too-short visit, we sit in my sunroom, and I give each of them a lantern. I want them to remember me, which I really don’t fear will be an issue. And I want to remind them to always “hold the lantern high.” I’ve bought one for myself as well, to hold for them as they make their way out of Guatemala, or the ER, or a spiritual labyrinth or one of the many places our life journeys will take us. I want them to know that I will always be there for them holding the light.

    Jill, Ellen, Beth, Brenda