Enjoy The Pages of Your Life

I was amazed that I remembered the way after all those years.  As we wound down to the river, along the twisting, dusty dirt road, somehow my heart remembered each turn. My teenaged daughter’s excitement in the seat next to me was nearly palpable, her green eyes gleaming with anticipation and joy.  After a long, dry spell of life, it was certainly good to be back again and away from the tension of the city.

“Come on, Dad!” she yelled with excitement, as she dove with her silver air mattress into the clear, icy water.  It isn’t for nothing that the river is named the “Frio” (the Spanish word for cold).  Over 90 degrees in the hot Texas sun, yet the spring-fed river never got much over 65 degrees.  It was like jumping from a hot and humid sauna into a river of ice cubes.  I chuckled as I watched my sisters and their children, who had waited patiently for us, as they gingerly entered the water ahead of me.

My daughter and her cousins giggled and splashed around me, and I floated quietly down the long and twisting river with the gentle current.  I finally began to relax.  The coolness of the water, the laughter of the children, and the warmth of the sunny, clear day surrounded me.  Familiar trees hung out over the water like old friends welcoming me back, large green branches spread wide, waving gently as we passed underneath.  It had been a long time.

As a small boy growing up, some of my favorite times were spent visiting my grandparents here and floating down this very river.  The river hadn’t changed much over the years, but I certainly had.  Still, years in the Army, moving to Colorado and life with a child of my own had not done much to dull the memories I had of this place.

Our visit several years earlier had been when my father passed away.  I remembered with sadness, that my sisters and I had helped my mother pack his things away.  With my three sisters and me spread all over the country and living in different states, it wasn’t often we were all together in the same place.  A nice change–this was at least a happy time visiting my mother that I could share with my daughter.

A nudge on my mattress wakened me from my musings.  “Hey, the waterfall is just ahead,” my sister Vicki quietly reminded me.  I nodded with a sly grin and a wink in the kids’ direction, waiting to see if they were paying attention.  I wasn’t worried about them since they are all excellent swimmers, but a sudden drop of ten or fifteen feet into a frigid pool can certainly be an eye-opener.  We hung back slightly with anticipation to see if our more humorous side was to be rewarded this time at our daughters’ expense.

Laughing and splashing each other, all the while closely packed together, neither realized their fate until first one, then the other fell, legs saluting the sky with abandon, followed swiftly by screams of mixed glee and startled awareness.  My sister Terri, who had obviously forgotten the traditional dunking of the last one in, at least abandoned her characteristic attempts at being dignified as she mock-fought off the children.  The tiny little girl I remembered running to meet me, chubby legs pumping, as I stepped off the school bus so many years before, was still there behind the grown woman’s eyes.

We passed all of our favorite childhood memories that day as we wound slowly down the Frio, the cool current caressing us and bringing us both the relief of the present and the fond memories of days long ago.  Stopping here and there, we shared our own memories with our children. The old, thick rope still hung where we had used it to swing with reckless abandon over the waiting river, and the clear deep turquoise pool, where the little fish still came to tickle our toes, was as inviting as ever.

Our energy drained by the bright, hot sun, our eyes heavy with relaxation and the hours we had spent on our river, our journey came to an end all too soon.  Dragging our leaden bodies from the water one last time, we stood for a moment looking back at the river as the dimming sun hid low behind the trees.  It was as if we were saying farewell once again to an old and dear friend, not knowing when we would see them again.

“Come on, you kids,”  My mother on the road above woke us from our thoughts. “Your sister has dinner almost ready back at the house.”  In the fading sunlight, she smiled widely as she waited for us to struggle our way up the steep and slippery bank as she had done so many times before, sparse frame and graying hair in her sixties still reflecting the quiet inner beauty she had always carried within her.  She rarely saw all of her children and grandchildren together–spread as we were across the map.  At least for a moment I could see the happiness shine in her hazel eyes like flecks of gold on jade velvet, through the sadness of my father’s passing she still felt, and her own fight with cancer.

This is how we would remember my mother, my daughter and I:  her smile and quiet manner belying the pain she felt, or perhaps overcome with the joy of her loved ones together one last time.  For this was to be our last time together.  My mother passed away a few months later and somehow I think she knew.

The river waits patiently for us, as it did for Mom when she was a child, its serenity and calm beckoning, yet the call now is bittersweet.  In our hearts, we always will have the memory of our last trip down the Frio.

This entry was posted Thursday, October 6th, 2005 at 8:23 pm and is filed under Poetry, Think About It. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.