Rubble, rock, and a rain gutter used for a waterfall. This was how I would have described my father’s pond area sixteen years ago. He had taken the trouble to run electricity to the pond with a “few” safety measures. The sound the water made from his combination was very pleasant, even if not visually beautiful. After my father passed, his garden passed to me, and I was struggling to make it my own. The pond area was not quite the happy place I had envisioned having for so many years. In my mind, I felt a happy place was a place you could take your troubles to and you would find peace. If you were anxious, you would calm down. Angry, you would find reason and resolving skills. Full of grief and worry, you would find comfort and strength to carry on. I had hungered for such a place for a very long time.Finding such a happy place wasn’t always easy in a life where a young teen bride and mother would go on to live in nearly forty different places, all by the time she reached her 50’s. Tiny, hot trailers, a military base townhouse, a few somewhat shady apartments, and low-income housing. Many were in dire need of repair. I loved the challenge of making them comfortable for my ever-increasing number of children. There was a new home where I was the minority on a reservation. I was afraid we would never fit in there, but we found lasting friendships and respect for our neighbors. There were apartments covered in roaches and eight dead bolts on the door. One house we struggled to keep warm during an especially hard time. A rented stove in the kitchen provided the only heat, but we had fun scrawling our names on the pretty, frosted window panes, or reading huddled under quilts.
There were so many places, but in each I’ve tried to make them homes for my wonderful children. I would scavenge for materiel for bright curtains and paint would become my best friend. Paint could work miracles! I would plant flowers wherever I could. Re-use wasn’t a common word back then. But that is just what I did. But, here was one thing that these places all had in common. No matter how hard I scrubbed or how hard we worked, none of them would ever truly be mine.
My mother and I were so much alike and this was probably the main reason our relationship was so tremulous. My mother was a very smart woman, and she knew me and knew that the one thing I needed the most in my world was my own home. That wonderful woman made that dream come true. As I painted, planted, arranged, and rearranged to my heart’s content I know this is really mine this time. I sometimes feel her so near me as I toil, and even hear her joyful laughter.
Outside my home, I’ve worked in the soil until I was covered with mud and sweat. I’ve ached in muscles I never knew before existed. I, with some slight regret, dismantled my father’s rain gutter rubble waterfall during my toils towards making my own little place in the world. The bees and the birds, the bunnies and fish join me there. My waterfall and small ponds sparkle like diamonds in the sunlight, and the rushing water fills the air with music. The heady smell of the flowers in every hue surrounds it all. This is a place of beauty. I find solace there from worry. It’s brought me great joy. I’ve cried both heart-wrenching tears and tears of unbelievable joy rocking in my old, weathered swing. The swing like me has seen better days, but we are both comfortable in this place. I breathe deeply the lovely scents and look over what I have created. I am grateful. I have found my happy place.
Originally published in Bottom Line News & Views, June 2017