SISTERS
Looking at them they don't really look
alike. One is taller and at
one time was a brunette, while the other one is short and was always referred
to as a dishwater blonde.
The resemblances are there, though, most evident
in the body language I suppose, but now in their sunset years (ha ha) their
hair matches up nicely!
The River walk in Carson City is a favorite
place~ a wetlands area in the midst of desert terrain. Together they walk the
path in the waning day. It is
October and the light slips away with the sun behind the mountains. Quickly the sky becomes
opalescent with colors of pearl and doubles upon itself in the water of the
pond. The cattails and
bulrushes bend down for a last view of themselves and a bird alights on a
slender reed. The new moon hangs
in the pale blue light and the beauty of the moment is eloquent--beyond
words. It vibrates as electric
current between them, and there is a knowing that is understood. They discuss the subtle colors of the
desert, name the birds and the waterfowl, their talk just a dusting over
feelings that lie close to their hearts.
What is
this bond? Common memories and
experiences? Life has taken them down widely different and separate paths, yet
these paths twist and curl and inevitably end at the beginning --in childhood. These were children born and raised in
the depression years--a time of deprivation and struggle, yet to these two,
come images of a simpler life, a basic uncomplicated existence; where few toys
and unlimited use of the imagination, allowed them to create their own
amusements. With a freedom unheard of in today’s world they roamed and explored, got dirty,
had Saturday night baths in a wash tub by the kitchen stove, with several
layers of caked on dirt to soak off. Then to bed in sheets that had hung out on the
clothesline in the sun, cozy in flannel pajamas, and snuggled together in the
same bed. Waking in the morning
and reading stories from Aesops Fables, Arabian Nights, Robinson Crusoe, Childs
Garden of Verses, and Mother Goose, The Scarecrow of Oz--those were our books
then, and we knew them by heart.
It is no wonder that they know how the other thinks--they learned to
think together.
They were
not unique in their bonding, but I believe the children of that era do share
the uniqueness of being the last generation to have benefited from that
uncomplicated existence, and to have gleaned certain basic truths---that life
is not only possible, but much richer without many of the things that we think
are necessary today; that children are often better served by less than by
more; that they will create, invent, devise or imagine their own entertainment,
and be better for it.
This October of 2000, was the time chosen for a
reunion of 3 cousins. These 3
girls along with another sister now gone, grew up in this same small corner of
the world, walked the same paths, climbed the same fences and trees, shared the
same grandma, aunties and uncles and cousins. In each other they see echoes of their mothers, reflections
of themselves in each others eyes, and hear familiar cadences in each others voices.
This coming together was a special time, made more special by the
magnificence of the environs of Lake Tahoe where they walked the shores and
stood beneath the splendor of the big trees. . . . . .and remembered.
They were
not the first nor will they be the last to have this heart-opening experience,
but this was exclusively and particularly ours. . . because it was us.
Betty Owen Journal
October 2000
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