But… there is also no life without love.”
Grandma
All the while that Rob had been shooting the shit with Grandpa, and doing that male bonding ritual that men do, Alex was in her own way becoming pretty close with Grandma. Everyday Alex would take her morning coffee and afternoon tea on Grandma’s front porch to discuss life. To Alex, it felt as if Grandma was becoming the mother, grandmother, and sister she’d never had. And for Grandma, Alex was fast becoming the daughter who had finally come home. Alex would never realize how blessed she was to have found Grandma and her years of hard earned wisdom, since not even her own daughters had ever been a recipient of the candidness that Grandma expressed with Alex.
Oddly, Alex found herself confiding some of her deepest secrets to Grandma, feeling as if she had found someone that she could trust for the first time in her life. Grandma had the ability to do that – make people feel that they could trust her with their life. She had all the qualities of a three hundred dollar an hour big city therapist – sans the insincerity. Grandma listened patiently as Alex babbled on and on about her painful relationship with Michael and how he had broken her heart. It was almost a relief to purge her pain to another human being for the first time in her life. Especially, to someone who always had the right answers, as if she had lived all the same sorrows as Alex, which indeed she had.
Not unlike Rob’s grandmother, Lilly, Grandma’s first child you see, was in fact not conceived from her husband’s sperm. Grandma’s first child as it were at the tender age of sixteen, had been the product of a childhood flame by the name of Warren Sparks. It seemed that Warren had professed his true love to Grandma, or Winifred (Wini), as she was known by at that age, and had even confirmed his intentions to her with a plastic Cracker Jack ring. She had given him in exchange the only possessions she owned – her undying love and her virginity. Two months later when she told Warren the reality of her most feared suspicions – that she was indeed pregnant with his child, he did what any gentleman would do faced with the given situation and gave his consent to plan the wedding. When the day rolled around for Warren to meet Wini at the church, to her horror, Warren was no where to be found. It seemed that he had jumped a freighter leaving for the Dominican Republic somewhere in the wee hours of the morning.
Seeing her heartbroken and rejected in that pretty white dress, Stanley, Warren’s best man, had decided that very moment that he was going to make this young girl forget all about Warren and claim her for his own. It took nearly a year for Wini to get over Warren but in time Stanley had worn her down; and before the anniversary of that shameful day she found herself back at the same alter once again wearing the same white dress, but this time her groom was in attendance, as was her beautiful four month old daughter. And, Stanley had remained so for some sixty years – loving Warren’s daughter as if she were his own. Oh, Grandma knew that Grandpa hadn’t been faithful for every minute of those years together, but nonetheless she knew that he was with her, for better or worse, until the day that she died.
“You know child,” Grandma said to Alex in that charming, refined West Indian dialect which seemed to be so uniquely her own. She had stopped to correct herself, realizing that Alex was hardly a child, but a grown woman with many of the same concerns and insecurities that she had felt that day in the church. “My Dear,” she continued, “You just have to let the pain of past heartbreaks go and move on with your life, otherwise you keep yourself from ever finding love again. You can’t fill a glass that’s already overflowing with heartbreak, you’ve just got to empty it to make room for something new. If you let it go, it will be refilled with all the right things, especially that sweet nectar of love.”
“But love is too painful to just allow it to come and go like a revolving door,” said Alex bitterly.
“What you truly need to understand is that someone can only cause you pain if you already have it inside you. Maybe you just need to look back a little farther than Michael to find where it all really started.”
Alex looked at her strangely as if she had just uncovered something that she had known deep down inside for most of her life, but had been afraid to think about let alone talk with someone else about it. Especially, someone who just a few short weeks ago was a perfect stranger.
Grandma, realized that she had hit a deeply hidden well for she had plumbed the depths of that same well herself since her pain had also gone far deeper than Warren. Grandma’s mother had come from England, a country far away which Winifred had never managed to visit. Her father, Timon, was a doctor of some note throughout the Caribbean – a surgeon in fact who had gone to University in Europe, and in addition to his degree had brought back a beautiful re-headed bride named Victoria.
Grandma had been born a year later to the happy prosperous couple in her father’s homeland of Grenada. Happy until that fateful day when Wini was five and Timon cut himself with a scalpel while performing a goiter surgery on a local woman. His patient recovered fully, however Timon succumbed to blood poisoning, which eventually claimed his life, leaving his grieving widow and daughter behind. Within a year, poor Victoria had developed consumption (Tuberculosis), a common occurrence at that time, and had found it necessary to be committed to a sanitarium back in London, from which she never recovered.
Wini was left in the care of her Grandparents, her father’s mother and father, who had raised her as their own giving her all the love she could have ever wanted. However, Wini had never quite recovered from her loss. Fate had taken her dear father from her, a man she had laughed and played with, and on whom she had relied for her security. And God, had returned her beautiful mother to rest in her homeland, robbing her of a mother’s love and leaving her orphaned and all alone, or so it felt to Wini.
So, Grandma knew the face of loneliness and pain and recognized it in Alex when Alex dropped her guard enough to show her true feelings about the loss of her own parents. “Sometimes we experience bad things and people in our lives to take a better look at ourselves and make us appreciate the right person when you finally do come across them,” Grandma said, “Just so we don’t take the real thing for granted.”
“But I’m afraid of falling in love again. I’m afraid I’ll loose them or they’ll betray me,” replied Alex before she’d even realized what she’d said.
What Alex didn’t understand yet was that it was fear itself and only fear that would create uncertainty and pain in her life. And, if she only had faith and trust in herself, and in her higher guidance, she would have found love by now. Fear is the one emotion that can control and overwhelm all other emotions and logic, and fear is truly the only thing in life that there is to be afraid of, since fear is the one thing that can destroy everything else.
“All fear1* is dear, is just a part of you that hasn’t discovered love yet. If you believe someone will hurt you they will. You can’t be afraid to feel deeply just because you fear you may lose someone. Fear is only your belief that something will be painful. The mind’s a powerful thing, you’ve just got to stop creating your disappointment in your mind,” answered Grandma sweetly as she took Alex’s hand in her own and squeezed it. Grandma stopped a minute and looked at Alex, “You take life too seriously. You need to laugh more… it’ll open your heart and soothe your soul. Give it time dear, love will find its way back into your heart. In fact, I think I can already hear it knocking at the door,” Grandma said with a smile as she glanced over at Rob who was watching Alex intently.
Doubt, qualms, hesitation, terror, and trepidation were all the things running through Alex’s mind at that moment as she watched Grandma watching Rob, watching her. What was Grandma seeing in Rob’s eyes for her that she hadn’t seen?
Grandma was a very perceptive woman who typified that age old paradigm of ‘woman’s intuition,’ and had an innate understanding of human nature. Having raised eight boys, Grandma had learned by now to read the signs of lovesickness which imbued a young man’s eyes at the height of its infection, and had re
cognized it early on in Rob’s dreamy glazes at Alex. She knew however, that there were inappropriate times to medal and inopportune times to not – this seemed to her to be one of those times where it was best to simply point out the obvious to the hesitant participant of the imminent amour, and let nature take its course. Of course, Grandma also realized that she was dealing with a woman who was nearly as strong willed and stubborn as she had been at that age and allowed herself a little indulgence in an attempt at out-and-out matchmaking. After all, it was obvious that these two needed more than a little coaxing to get over their fear of admitting their feelings for one another and Grandma was more than happy to oblige with her services.
“You know dear,” Grandma said to Alex, “I think you should answer that door, you never know what treasures might await you on the other side.”
Alex caught herself with a doubtful laugh, “You can’t really mean Rob? He’s still so in love with that Italian princess that he can’t even see that I exist. Besides, Rob and I always seem to find our way into an argument.”
“Sometimes it’s a sign that someone really likes you, when they care enough to be bothered by what you disagree about. Besides that, you have to understand that he’s scared too, just as scared as you are about the two of you getting together,” said Grandma with a strong measure of confidence.
“Now why on earth would he be scared of me? He’s the kind of man who’s always gotten everything he wanted.”
“Maybe everything he thought he wanted. It seems that he’s starting to reevaluate what’s really important in life and realizing that maybe there’s more to a good woman than pretty clothes and fine manners.
Alex thought about this for a moment in silence.
“Don’t you realize that you intimidate him?”
Alex just looked at Grandma curiously.
“This princess you’re referring to, only bossed him around but he still felt like the man in the relationship. Men want women to be women my dear. They just simply don’t know how to respond to women any other way. You see, the problem you have is that you’re more capable than him in the things that are an important part of his life right now, and it scares him. You’re a strong and independent woman who’s totally capable of taking care of herself. Don’t you see that it makes him feel as if you don’t need a man in your life?”
“But what can I do to make him feel more… manly, I mean, I’m just doing the job he hired me to do? It would be different if he knew how to sail and build a boat. Look at him, he’s got so much to learn but he doesn’t want me to be his teacher. I mean every time I try to show him how to do a job he refuses to listen to me, and then he goes about nearly killing himself or a paying passenger.”
“Well, it’s a wise woman who knows how to recognize what a man needs and give it to him without him actually realizing you’re doing it. You can be his teacher if you really want to without him ever even knowing it.”
Alex considered this for a beat.
“Trust me girl, I’ve raised enough boys to be somewhat of an expert on what makes them tick. Nine all tolled including Grandpa here. Give him a chance to learn without him realizing you’re his tutor. None of us ever stops learning lessons, even the master learns from his pupil.”
Of Grandma’s thirteen, only four had been girls – two older – two younger, placing the burden on the older two to help Grandma with the cooking and rearing of their younger siblings. Sara, the oldest, had run off with a young man from Barbados at seventeen and Myra had joined the Peace Corps the day she’d turned eighteen. As much as Grandma had adored her daughters it was her sons that had taught her the most about life, and about herself. They had inspired her, intrigued her, and exhausted her all at the same time. Girls were easy to raise, but boys were work – especially with a household of them underfoot. Grandma had gone gray early on and had longed for a husband at home to discipline them since Stanley was always on the road. Of course, she couldn’t find it in her heart to impose punishment of any kind on them. In fact they had pretty much run wild. But, as wild as they were, she had done her best to teach them values with love, even if her own meager education had limited her in worldly tutorledge. All of her sons had grown to make her proud – all but two, her first and her last. And all had left the island to seek their own life, love, and fortune from North America to Argentina.
“You see dear, we were put here to learn and grow and the only way you can do that is through relationships with another. Now of course there’s no denying that some relationships bring you pain and others pleasure, and some make you feel as if you’ve gone to heaven while some make you feel like you’ve woken up in hell, but it’s all important, it’s all part of growing. In fact, it’s the only thing we’re truly here to learn. Love is what feeds us dear. Why it’s the fruit of life. It’s what sustains us and makes us feel alive.”
“Then I guess I haven’t learned much this time around,” sighed Alex.
“You know, if you’re afraid to climb the tree to pick the fruit you starve yourself of the sweetness of life,” responded Grandma. “Even if there are parts that are bitter there’s always a sweetness underneath. It’s like eating paw paw.2* You put lime on it before you eat it since the bitterness makes the fruit that much sweeter.”
Grandma, was indeed, as she had suggested, an expert on child rearing. But, raising her children had not always been an easy road, even if a happy smile had always somehow managed to grace that wise, serene face of hers since she had lost two of her sons, her first and her last along the way. You see, her thirteenth child, Dougie, born to her at the age of forty-four, had come into the world with downs syndrome, and had lived only to the age of seventeen. But Grandma, who had always loved every little creature with everything she possibly had to give, felt in some way that this, although imperfect little guy, was the most perfect gift she had ever been given. Having pretty much raised her rambunctious brood by that point, she found Dougie to truly be her little heaven sent angel. The day he died in her arms, she’d picked up a pen and had begun to write her first poem. A poem about her precious little boy who had loved everything and everyone equally, with no trace of judgment or preference. Since that day, Grandma had spent her time writing or reading, feeling the need to fill up her days turning her hard earned wisdom into verse and rhyme.
1*FEAR – (Synonymous with) Doubt, qualms, hesitation, terror, and trepidation.
2*PAW PAW – A slang word in the islands for the fleshy, edible, orange/yellow fruit – Papaya. Not to be mistaken with the North American tree, bearing fleshy, yellow fruit
HINDSIGHT!
Had anyone told me when I was a girl,
Happily lost in a carefree whirl,
Not still believing in Elves and Fairies
But dizzy on Romance
And True Life Stories –
Had anyone warned me that I would give birth
To a Baker’s Dozen!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’d have hooted with mirth
Perhaps, or quietly fainted away
To sleep like Van Winkle
Until today!
Lorna Steele
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
AC-DC
“How do you know if you’re in love? You don’t have to ask.”
Grandma
As I said before, Rob was pretty ripe for Alex’s affection, but she was not showing any signs of interest, and he was getting closer and closer to braving climbing that tree to pick the fruit himself. His misjudgment of Alex and her self-prescribed aloofness towards him only served to frustrate him and make him more and more uncertain of how to approach her. There were days that Rob felt he was making headway with Alex, and other days that left him feeling as if he were paddling upstream in a rowboat with a tennis racket. The fact that Rob’s ego was still not totally back in tact, and the fact that he was a compulsive over-thinker, led him to such unreasonable conclusions as to even question Alex’s preference of gender. Offering Rob a far less painful solution to his lack of prog
ress with her romantically than of course the most logical thought that she just wasn’t interested. It never even crossed his mind that she might be as hesitant as he to take the plunge into deep water by making the first move. Little did he know that Alex was all the while wishing that he would just sweep her off her feet and woo her until the cows came home as opposed to Lambchop, Rob’s new hooven companion who never left his side for a moment, especially when Alex was around. Lambchop, it seemed, had made himself right at home in their little boatyard.
In lieu of romance, work was progressing on the Island Fever at about the speed of the mail in the West Indies, and as per Grandma’s advise, Alex had begun finding more and more small jobs which she felt Rob could handle without injuring himself or some passer-by. Sanding appeared to be a safe enough task for Rob, given that aside from relatively minor skin abrasions, there was little damage that could be inflicted by a sheet of 60 grit sandpaper. Of course, an electric sander was another story altogether, and Alex chose to play it safe and leave the power tools to herself and “Home Improvement,” which they occasionally caught a glimpse of on local TV after someone had recorded it on their home VCR stateside, and sold it to their friends at “de islan” TV station. Of course, it was several months out of date, but then, the same could be said for the daily news, since it was also pre-recorded on video tape then shipped air freight to the island, being broadcast at least two to three days later than it had originally happened. Of course, the great advantage in not getting the news until several days later was that the world could end and you’d have at least two extra days before you found out about it. And as far as the “New York Times,” the “Washington Post,” the “Miami Herald,” or the “Wall Street Journal” went, about the best that one could hope for was a pre-read copy which some tourist had brought with them on the plane. But then who cares about current events when you’re living at least three steps behind in Paradise. Their theory was, anything that’s of any great importance can and will eventually be heard via the island’s, once again, most reliable source of information – the ‘Coconut Telegraph.’
West of the Quator Page 24
