by Victoria -

Jess and the sparrow

I first penned this back in the Spring of 2014 when I was struggling with that age-old issue of forgiving.  Why is it so hard to do, and why is it so hard to remember how important it is?

The chains were too tight. They threatened to cut off her breath. Jess kept waiting for her tormentor to let her go.

“Please!” She begged – “I have nothing more to give you!”

She slowly sank down to the ground in her small, dark cage and leaned her back against the cold bars. Drawing her knees up to shield her face, she sobbed out her grief. How long has she been here? She had lost track of time. The days and nights crept forward, never halting, and without illumination.

She knew she had been here for many days.

There was a very small opening in the stone wall up near the ceiling that let in air and just a hint of light sometimes.

Would her little friend stop by to visit again today?   He was just a sparrow, but she really looked forward to hearing him pecking around outside her window.

Just yesterday she thought she heard him speaking to her. I’m getting delusional, she thought.

But she distinctly remembered his squeaky whispers.

“Let it go”. That’s what she heard. It echoed in her mind and she couldn’t shut out the voice. Was that really what he said?

No, that can’t be right. What could she let go of? She was chained here – a prisoner.

“Jess, Jess!”

Who is there? Was it her little friend again today?

“I can hear you, little sparrow!” Oh, dear God please don’t let me be losing my mind! Jess thought.

“I have the key for you, Jess!”

Those squeaky whispers made her heart leap for joy.

“Where is it? I’m right here!” A sob caught in her throat as her hope awakened.

“You must listen ever so carefully, ok?”

“Ok!”

“Let it go.”

“What?”

“Let it go. Forgive.”

“What?!”

“Let it go. Forgive.”

Her new hope withered and died. Just like that. Clearly she was delusional. Let go of what? And forgive who? Surely he wasn’t suggesting she forgive her tormentor?

Out of the question! How could she forgive the very one inflicting her pain day in and day out? No one should be expected to do that.

By the time she came to herself, her little friend had left.

She felt more lonely and abandoned than she had ever felt in her life. Even her little friend mocked her pain.

But his words drilled themselves deep down inside her heart. And became a mantra.

Three days later, after listening to this mantra almost non-stop, she heard her little friend outside.

But, wait, it sounded different.

“Are you there, little friend?”

“Don’t listen to him – you’ve been wronged! You need justice and revenge! Don’t listen to him!”

“Who are you?”

“Hold tightly and never forgive and never forget!”

“Wait! What?”

She heard a slithering sound and then silence.

Confusion filled her heart. Oh, please, I just want my little friend back! Please!

She threw herself down to the filthy dirt floor and cried out her frustration and conflict. After a while, she became calm. Her thoughts drifted and she began to remember.

There were some good times. Yes, that’s true. They weren’t all bad. Her thoughts went further back in time. Back beyond her own personal knowledge of events. She saw her tormentor as a child. Then as a young person. Then as an adult. She saw things and her heart warmed to this person who had experienced their own brand of hurt.

And she began to understand.

“Hi, Jess!” whispered her little friend. She could hear a smile in his voice today.

“Are you ready to use your key?” he said to her.

“Yes, oh, yes!” she cried out.

“Wonderful! I’ll see you outside then. It’s a beautiful day here – come on!”

Her little friend was so right – it was a gorgeously beautiful day, and Jess, with her arms lifted high danced around and around until she fell to the ground laughing , inhaling the sweet scent of the flowers.

by Victoria -

Pinecones and the Ocean

I originally wrote this post back in February of 2012, when I was transitioning from living alone in Arizona to moving back to Michigan to help my dad take care of my mom who had been diagnosed with dementia.  I knew life was going to get difficult, and this vacation in Florida at the time was a welcome hiatus.  Having family close when life gets tough is priceless.

I awoke to the steady, almost deafening, drumming of rain on the metal roof of the beautiful rental we were calling home for the week.

I know its February, but I thought it was supposed to be sunny and warm in Florida.

I left Arizona for this?

Ah, yes, because there’s something else here of more value to me than the mountains and desert and sunshine and heat of Arizona.   Although, come to think of it, those are really, really nice things.

As I began to collect my thoughts, I heard the muffled sounds of the television emanating from the other room. Sounded like my grandsons Noah and Luke were watching cartoons again.

After washing my face and getting dressed, I wandered downstairs to find some life-giving coffee. My daughter was busy reading a book, and the boys were running around still in their pajamas.

After a while the rain let up, so I braved the front porch, perched on the porch swing under the safety of the roof, and listened to the birds. They were quite busy breakfasting on small red berries. I’ve never seen so many robins perched together in a tree before, and a small one at that. The sound of their constant twittering and the whoosh of their wings was calming, and I smiled.

I watched as the gray clouds skittered across the sky and patches of blue began to peek out. I sipped my coffee and sighed a deep sigh of contentment.

Maybe the rain would stop soon and we could go for another walk to gather pine cones again.

Here we are in Florida gathering pine cones. Seems like a funny thing to do.

It was like a scavenger hunt, or trick or treat, finding the pine cones. We found some discarded plastic bags and the boys and I loaded them up. Along with a few sticks and acorns. But mostly pine cones.

We took turns holding hands and running and laughing.

It really doesn’t matter what the weather is doing when you’re with family, does it?

Of course, when I’m in Florida, every day is a bad hair day. This I have come to accept. Frizzy hair is what I have there and that’s just the end of it. I can fuss with it all I want, and within minutes – poof – back it goes to frizz again. I just give up after a day or two, knowing that I look a bit wild. I avoid mirrors.

The boutique shops are always fun to poke around in. I don’t usually buy anything, but virtual shopping is satisfying in a virtual sort of way. I really liked the brightly colored skirts and tops, but I didn’t like the price tags attached. So, that was that.

When it looked like the rain was done for the day, we made our way across the street, down a wooden walkway, and found the Gulf in all of its majesty right there at our feet. The sight made you stop and drink in the view. The water was gorgeous. The blue-green waves with their ruffles of white lace stretched to the horizon and met with the grays of the sky to frame the pictures I kept snapping. I kept some of the soft white sand in the photos too for contrast and context. Lots of memories.

The wind was whipping up pretty cold coupled with the continual crashing sound of the waves as they met the sand and then receded only to gather themselves again and fling their combined droplets forward, stretching, stretching. The mark the waves leave in the sand is temporary. No matter how loud and how strong. Only temporary. The next wave washes away the evidence over and over and over.

The only things left behind are small shells and bits of driftwood. And those are picked up and carted off.

Do you think the ocean gets frustrated? All that effort and nothing much of lasting significance to show for it?

He can be content in knowing we hear and see and enjoy the show. The sights and the sounds mesmerize us. The sand tickles our toes and transports us back to childhood again, as we dig and build sand castles and write our names with sticks just out of reach of the next wave.

Hopefully, I’ll have left some lasting impressions when my waves are finally stilled.

Like collecting pine cones and holding hands and laughing.  

Yeah, I think that will be ok.

by Victoria -

Bicycle in the trees

This article was originally published in the Lynn Haven Ledger as a human interest story in June, 2018.

The leaves, fluttering in the now cooling breeze with the sun dappling their faces, saw it there once again. But that was not unusual. It showed up there most days for a few minutes. The season changed and the rains started and the leaves, now old and heavy with water, let go of their branches and pirouetted to the ground, adding to the ever increasing layer of nature’s detritus on the woodsy floor, soggy and soft, muffling all sound except for the wind.

The next summer came and still it stood there. The trees didn’t mind. The squirrels and lizards, rabbits and neighborhood cats believing themselves to be dangerous predators, crawled, jumped, and climbed around, over, and through as it stood there patiently waiting for someone to return.

As years passed, the trees grew ever taller and greater in girth like older men who love to eat and hate to exercise. As each new season’s leaves looked on, the tree eventually absorbed much of the abandoned and forgotten bicycle now rusted through. Almost like the trees in Fangorn Forest that sucked the unsuspecting Hobbits inside their trunks to devour them whole. But there was no wizard in Lynn Haven to deliver the bicycle.

It was Wes’ bike. Back in 1986, Jeremy’s parents had built their house on a lot they’d recently purchased, and, as parents are wont to do, also put up a fence to not only keep neighborhood kids from using their backyard as a thoroughfare but to corral Jeremy’s younger brother who loved to wander.   They included a gate so Jeremy’s good friend Wes could meet him in the morning and together they’d ride their bikes to school.   The boys were both in 5th grade at the Lynn Haven Elementary school when they started journeying together.

The small copse of trees bordered the two properties, lending some privacy to each family’s backyard. The boys would meet at the fence in the mornings before school and, together, they would ride their bikes there and back again. Jeremy and Wes were good friends and continued their daily routine until they graduated to high school where it was too far to ride their bikes.

Life moved on for the boys who, 32 years later, have careers and friends and don’t remember much anymore about those daily rides to school. Or the whereabouts of Wes’ long forgotten bicycle.

I tried to interview the bicycle, but it was not in a mood for conversation. I’d love to hear its perspective on what it heard and observed as days turned to months and then years to decades.

I remember about five years ago traveling through Kentucky on Highway 31. We came to a sign that said “Prehistoric Indian Artifacts”, and I remember laughing out loud at such a silly attempt at marketing. Wes’ bicycle isn’t prehistoric, or buried treasure like you might dive for in Panama City Beach, and it doesn’t have any monetary value.

But it’s a pretty interesting thing to see. Two trees, instead of pushing a foreign object out of their way, instead patiently grow around it until the bicycle becomes an integral part of the landscape. It’s hard to see in the shade of the trees.

There’s certainly a life lesson here.

I have Facebook friends from Michigan where I grew up. They regularly complain about the weather, especially in the long and seemingly unending winters. I tell them, “pack up your crap and move down here”. But they always have an excuse. They’re kind of like that bicycle letting time and lack of ambition keep them stuck in a place they don’t really want to be, but the effort to change is greater than their dissatisfaction.

I think Wes’ bicycle would have preferred to have been kept inside a garage out of the elements and over time passed down to the next generation of adventurous children wanting a quicker way to get to where they wanted to go.

But, like I said, the bicycle refused to comment, so I can only speculate.