Where There are no Cornfields

There were times during my trip to Australia when I was struck by how much it felt like home, times when it felt so un-foreign, so normal; times when I felt like we could easily just be on a road trip somewhere in the States. There were subtle differences, of course, the driving on the wrong side of the road, the large stretches of undeveloped land that were just land and not cornfields, that it was November and Christmas and summer were approaching simultaneously. But often it all felt very familiar. Because of this I tried extra hard to take note of the things that were very unfamiliar.

There were things I wrote down, things I took photos of, and then there were the things that I didn’t record because there was no way to capture them, things that I could only savor in the moment and hope they would come back to me one day. I attended a liquor tasting recently and the smell of a certain rum triggered one of these memories.

Our first stop in Australia was Cairns, Queensland, from there we quickly headed north to The Daintree Rainforest. We drove north until we couldn’t go any farther and then we drove in. We drove into the thick of the Daintree with all the trees, frogs, birds, and bugs. And then it rained. It rained hard and often. It rained so much it felt like a Hemingway novel.

We eventually made our way out of the rainforest because we were sick of being damp and because it was just time to move on. And it was there, somewhere between tropical rainforest and tropical beaches, that I first smelled the scent of sugar cane mixed with the wet heavy air from the Daintree. It was there where you have to watch out for the cane trains, there where you can still see the steam rising from where the rainforest meets the ocean.

The smell of sugar cane, especially burning sugar cane, is sweet, deep, and earthy. It’s complex and layered and too much to take in at once. It hits you first as a dense wall and is a little startling especially when it’s something you’ve never smelled before. It burns a little and you can taste it in the back of your throat. But then you recover and you breathe it in deeply. It moves through you slowly, like molasses, and you hope you will never forget this smell and the feeling it brings; this smell that is so foreign, that smells like a place that is a world away from home.

Grandpa Flower

I’m 27 years old and all four of my grandparents are alive and well. This is, I believe, rare. It’s a treat, a privilege, bestowed on few. I’ve been able to get to know my grandparents, to hear their life’s stories and adventures in their own words. They are amazing multi-faceted people and their lives intrigue me. And while they have all led extraordinary lives, I can see each of my grandparents as just plain human beings in a very real, very palpable way I don’t think would be possible if I hadn’t been able to spend my life so far getting to know them.

Here are a few of my favorite memories, my favorite stories, about my Grandpa Flower.

Grandpa Flower used to call my sister, Susan, and myself Penelope and Maryann. This is something I hadn’t thought about in years but recently remembered during a trip home for Christmas. I believe Susan was Penelope and I was Maryann and I can’t remember when he stopped calling us that. Oh, and to be clear, he called us those names as a joke, not as a result of a fading memory or out of old-person confusion. That was Grandpa when we were kids, always teasing us, always joking around with us.

Whenever it was time to leave Grandpa and Grandma’s house we would hug Grandma good-bye, then giggle in anticipation of Grandpa’s bear hug and big sloppy noisy kiss on the cheek. The last few times I’ve been home a much older, slightly more serious, Grandpa has hugged me in a way he never used to, in a way you hug someone when you realize you will not always be able to hug him.

In middle school and high school, studies about World War 2 always made me think of him and always made me realize how little I know about the large man with a crew cut who likes to sit in his big arm chair and watch the game. I know his family background is complicated with divorce and alcoholism, I know he used to teach chemistry and coach basketball, I know he was shot once in the war, and I know he won’t talk about most of that stuff.

Possibly my favorite memory of my Grandpa Flower was at his and my Grandma’s 50th wedding anniversary party. There were photos everywhere of their younger selves. Grandma was an absolute knockout when she was younger, stunning in a classic way, in a creamy white skin and cherry lipstick kind of way. A party guest approached Grandpa at one point and said to him Nell was beautiful when she was younger. Without missing a beat, without a smirk or a silly smile, Grandpa said, “still is.” His response gave me goose bumps and I knew then that I want what they have someday.

Christmas Letter 2005

Greetings:

I’m currently finding myself in the midst of my first holiday season away from home. And, while good friends and Rocky Mountain paradise surround me, I’m a bit nostalgic for Christmastimes past. There are certain Flower family holiday traditions that can only be shared at home, however there are a couple I’ve found I can preserve on my own. The first is listening to Christmas music for the entire month of December. The second is writing my very own Christmas letter in a way I can only hope will make my father proud. With that I give you the past year of my life (and a how-to for stepping out on your own for the first time).


Make the decision to move away from home, let it twist and turn in your head, pray it’s the right one, and hope that Colorado’s the Promised Land they say it is. Remember that it’s been almost a year now since you graduated from college and that, as much as you love Mom, Dad, and working at that little local coffee shop, as scary as this move is, you have a nagging hunger to see what else it out there. Write your last article for Allegan County Living magazine and make one last vanilla latte for your favorite regular. Send your resume to the Starbucks in Vail, get hired over the phone, and promise them you’ll be there by May.

The day when you have to say good-bye to your sisters, brother, cats, dog and mom will come way too fast. Cry when you hug your mom, she’ll hold you so tight it hurts a little, hug her back just as tightly.

You’ll feel a little nervous on the car ride to Colorado but mostly you’ll find it strange that you feel so confident, so assured that this is right. As you pass through Iowa, Nebraska, and into Eastern Colorado realize that you have, indeed, discovered the Middle-of-Nowhere. Try to call Rand McNally to let him know where to mark it on the map. Don’t be surprised when you can’t get through because you don’t have cell service.

Naturally your stomach will flutter a bit as you near Denver, but don’t worry, as soon as you start winding up through those majestic mountains in the distance, you’ll feel at home.

Try not to cry too much when you have to say good-bye to your dad.

Start your new job right away and love it because your co-workers are great and the atmosphere there is more that of a small-town coffee shop than a Starbucks. You’ll be promoted to Shift Supervisor within the first month.

Be in awe of your surroundings in that little mountain resort town. You’ll mostly be in the company of your boyfriend and his buddies. Try to keep up with them. Go for lots of hikes in those first few weeks, huff and puff as your lungs try to acclimate to the altitude. Don’t cry or complain when thorny weeds scratch deep into your legs or when you slip on a rock crossing a stream and bruise your shin. Get over the layer of dirt that has covered your entire body and keep trekking. Take note of your surroundings, of rushing waterfalls, alpine lakes, sapphire skies, and blooming wildflowers. Be humbled by it all.

Go camping at a place that has no modern plumbing. Sleep in a tent, cook over the fire, don’t shower for a couple days, and love it. These camping adventures will take you swimming in the Colorado River, bathing in natural hot springs, and star-gazing under a sparkly black blanket you never knew existed. Wish on more shooting stars under those brightly lit nights than you ever have before.

The summer won’t be all fun and games. You’ll be homesick, particularly after seeing your family when they come out to bring your brother to college. You’ll miss your girlfriends and your old job. You’ll miss all the things about home that you hated when you were living there.

Turn 23 in September and wonder if you’re a grown-up yet.

Plan a trip with your boyfriend to visit home in the fall. Decide to also visit Seattle and San Francisco and everything in between. A month or so before you depart for this trip quit your job at Starbucks because, somewhere around July, it stopped being fun and you didn’t move to Colorado to work, at least not at a lousy job. Decide to work at Bailey’s, the little Vail Resorts-owned coffee shop on top of the mountain.

In Seattle visit the Pike’s Place Market and see the famous fish-tossing fishermen. Stop by the first Starbucks and listen to the street musicians playing outside. It will rain a lot all the way down the coast. Appreciate all that you see anyway. You’ll touch the Pacific Ocean for the first time, drive through a redwood, and cross the Golden Gate Bridge. Oh, and don’t forget to have lunch with your dad once you reach San Francisco, he’ll be there on business.

Once you’re back in Vail snow will start to fall and you’ll begin making friends with all the people who have moved there for the winter. Start riding the gondola up the mountain to work every day and taking snowboarding lessons on your days off. You’ll soon see more snowfall in one week than you’ve seen in two months in Michigan. After the storms pass the sun will shine for days on end.

Realize on the way home from work one night, while you’re sitting alone in a gondola car watching the rising moon cast a soft glow on fresh powder as it peeks over the mountains, that you’re content. Realize that this is true even though you still miss your friends and family sometimes, that this is true even though you can’t be with them on Christmas. Something in the moon will remind you that you’re never too far away from the ones you love, and for that reason you can find joy in this holiday season away from home.

Have a blessed Christmas and New Year.

Love,
Tracey

Giving Thanks

The following is an email I sent my family last Thanksgiving and I like it so much I want to share with everyone who reads Flower Blog this Thanksgiving.


As a child I was taught that the first Thanksgiving happened when the pilgrims and Indians sat and feasted together. Both parties brought food to share and they were all thankful for the companionship. In elementary school we made pilgrim hats and Indian feathers out of construction paper and sat pilgrim next to Indian at the school’s Thanksgiving lunch.

As an adult I’ve been taught that meal or no meal the pilgrims murdered many Indians and stole their land. I’ve been taught to refer to Indians as Native Americans as if that somehow makes amends for the sins of my ancestors.

The true origins of Thanksgiving are fuzzy to me and I find it difficult to describe the reason for the day to my non-American friends. The lesson generally leads to stories of how poorly the Native Americans were treated by the first settlers, a part of American history I’m not particularly proud of.

Tomorrow I will join 20-plus friends for a meal. We will be American, Australian, English, and South American and we will eat, drink, and be merry together. Regardless of whether or not the first Thanksgiving went the way I was taught as a child, regardless of the messiness that came later, I hope to show them that this is what Thanksgiving is about.

Because that is what this holiday is about, isn’t it? It’s about family, friends, and feasting. It’s about coming together and reminding ourselves that, despite the doom preached on the news, we have so very much to be thankful for. And this year, more than years past, I can’t help but feel hope. Hope that in small ways, like a meal where African refugees eat with white Americans, this is the place those pilgrims hoped it would be. A country where change is possible and the dreams of our forefathers are still tangible.

And for that I am very thankful.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Small Town Seasons: A Sonnet

For this post I decided to revisit some writing work from college. The following is a sonnet I wrote for a creative writing course that covered fiction, poetry, and playwriting. Poetry is not my strong suit and I don’t enjoy reading or writing it. The segment of that course that focused on poetry is the only training I’ve had in the subject. I fumbled through it and, in the end, my professor agreed that poetry isn't my forte. That said, I think any writer can benefit from studying poetry. Studying and writing poetry, sonnets in particular, for that course taught me an important lesson in structure and simplicity. If I remember correctly this was the only poem I wrote that received positive feedback from my professor and reading it not only reminds me of those lessons, it also makes me smile.


A crystal sea of fresh water stretches

endlessly. Rumbling waves tumble one

over another; their tongues making etches

in the cool compact grains on shore. The sun

majestically warms her subjects who flip from

back to front like pancakes on a griddle.

Then they will swarm these small town streets like bums.

They’ll eat. They’ll shop. They’ll drink. They’ll dance. Little

by little, though, they will disappear. Behind

them they will leave only scraps of summer;

grains of sand mingling with snow drops. Kind

signs that read “Closed for Winter.” A shrinking number

of subjects stroll the streets. An icy zephyr

roars off the water, moving things like feathers.

RE: Snow on the Gore, DATE: August 27, 2006

Fall in Vail can be both lovely and torturous. The weather can be beautiful or miserable. The town becomes ghost-like and the locals refer to the heart of it as mud season. The following is an email I wrote to my dad at the very start of my first fall in Vail.

Dad:

It’s been in the air for a couple weeks now but today it happened. The seasons clicked. Labor Day might still be a week away but today marked the end of summer, the beginning of fall, and the promise that winter won't be far behind. I felt the colder air before I even got out of bed and it encouraged me to stay snuggled in the blankets long after my alarm went off. When I pushed the curtains aside and peeked out the window I saw the first dusting of snow on the Gore Range. The clouds were thick and low; they were grey and menacing.

The leaves are just starting to turn yellow and the autumnal equinox is still a month away. There will be days in the next few months when the sun shines and Valley residents savor the last flickers of summer. But that crisp feeling in the air today will linger until snow covers everything and it will remind us, like the snow on the Gore does today, that winter is never far behind us or in front of us.

Love, Tracey

Day at the Beach

I often write letters to people in my journals, letters I’ll never send and the recipient will never read. I recently came across the following letter that I wrote to a friend during a trip back to Michigan after my first summer in Vail. I still remember this day and how I felt when I wrote this.

October 21, 2005

Today, inspired by your creativity and tales of days spent combing the sand for treasures, I spent some time on the beach. I felt drawn to it by the crisp breeze blowing across the lake, by the sound of waves lapping at the shore and the gulls’ distant squawks. I sat in the cool beige sand in a spot surrounded by long dune grass, which sheltered me a bit from the chilly breeze and allowed me to fully reap the benefits of the sun’s warm rays. I watched sea gulls swoop down and spiral up into an endless blue sky and I was jealous of them.

I reviewed the events of our vacation thus far and thought about the summer, I recalled the most defining moments, and realized how I’ve changed and how I’m continuing to change. I thought about us and about possibilities. I daydreamed about the future.

I went for a walk along the water after a nap in the sun. Zebra mussel shells crunched beneath my feet as I walked; there were thousands of them washed up along the water’s edge. I bent down and examined a cluster of them and marveled at how even a pest such as this one is beautiful. It made me think about how there are many things in this world that are both incredibly beautiful and horrible at the same time.

I found a stick on my walk, it was strong and smooth and all the rough edges had been whittled away by water and sand. Wavy lines in different shades of gray ran the length of the stick and its ends were rounded and dull. It seemed to carry with it a story, a journey that I couldn’t completely comprehend.

When I turned around and began making my way back up the beach I saw two women walking toward me, as they neared I noticed one was using a red-tipped white walking cane and was latched onto the arm of the other woman, using her as a guide. I observed them discreetly as they walked. They were talking quietly and seemed to be enjoying the same peaceful moment I was. I tried to imagine what it would be like to be blind on such a walk, to smell the fresh water breeze, to hear the children laughing in the distance and the waves next to you, to feel the soft sand under your feet, but not be able to see the grandness of the scene. I wondered if she had been without sight for her entire life or if it was something she had lost along the way. I closed my eyes for a moment as I walked but I could still see the vivid colors that surrounded me. I wanted to tell the woman, explain to her what it all looked like, how the sun, the sky and the trees around us looked like fall; the trees in their multi-colored grandeur, the sun at an angle that seemed to show everything in a new light, a light that reminds you of how rapidly everything around you is changing. I wondered if she feels lonely at times, even when she has a friend beside her, when all her other senses whisper to her the beauty of a day she cannot see. Goosebumps tickled my arms and a sadness moved through me at the thought of such a loneliness. I realized that a day such as this one could be so beautiful but carry with it such a heavy emotion and how, in a way, it was very much like those pesky zebra mussels.

I also realized, on the beach today, how precious days like this, moments like this, are. I felt like I had walked into an exquisite photograph for a few hours where only I existed. I believe the beach is a magical place, it’s the only place I’ve ever experienced these quiet moments of Zen and it is my deepest wish to carry this day with me for awhile.