April 30, 2007
Desert Roses
Keeping stacks of photo albums is not something I do. The way I see it is that if you can’t remember it, taking a picture won’t help. So I went through the snapshots in my head trying to remember five instances which I thought were memorable enough to write about. The first one was an 8mm film my mother had filmed when I was around two. I was running around my paternal grandfather’s yard showing off for my dad. Eventually he catches me, which was the point of the whole running around bit. I didn’t get to know my father, he and my mother divorced when I was three or four. I can’t remember if I loved him or not. I imagine I did, don’t all little girls love their daddies no matter what? Of course, the only reason I remember it at all is because my stepfather made the 8mm into video for me and I remember parts of the video.
The second was of me becoming a mother for the first time, at age 18, actually 20 days after I turned 18. In 1974, I got pregnant, graduated high school, got married, and had my first child, in that order. I was real busy in 1974. There I am holding my first child, I was one proud mother. He is my first True Love. He was so pretty with his big blue eyes and long eyelashes; everywhere I went people commented on what a beautiful baby girl he was. I got tired of correcting them, so I just said “thank you”. My son was born in Hawaii on Thanksgiving and my Hawaiian neighbors called him Maka Nui Nui, big bright eyes.
The third picture is of me holding my second child, my daughter, the love of my life. She was born on Valentine’s Day 1978. Yes, my children want to be remembered at holidays. The fourth snapshot is of the kids and my boyfriend standing in front of the giant anchor at Pearl Harbor. God, we had such a wonderful day that day. My boyfriend, was with us for six wonderful years. We went to several historical sites on Oahu that day, someday I will go back and see them all again. Since then my life has been like a Concord flight, almost at the speed of sound. Most of it is a blur. Mostly due to my brain injuries sustained in 1994.
The photo I do have and look at a lot is the one taken in Old Town a couple of years ago when my life long companion, and I were pretending to be tourists. It’s like a mini vacation for us. When you are poor working class, it’s the only vacation you are going to get. Just a couple of bucks worth of gas, two sandwiches and another three bucks for a couple of big sodas at Seven-Eleven, and we are set for our adventures. We visit our favorite stores, complain about everything being made in China, smooze with the clerks, look for new-to-us ceramic artists and ooh-ahh over the Native American handmade pots that we will be never be able to afford.
I am finally starting to learn to be grateful for what I have and not whine about what I don’t have. My companion is who I am grateful for the most. I have learned more from him than I learned on my own. The day I learned to be grateful was when he told me I was richer than King Louis the fourteenth, the Sun King. Now you must understand that I spent most of my youth in Europe. I have walked through the Louvre, and seen its treasures, I have been atop the Eiffel Tower in Paris, I have seen the real Mona Lisa. I have seen the tulip fields in Holland, and the miniature villages. I have been all over Spain and Germany. I have visited many castles, and stared at famous tapestries, paintings, sculptures, I’ve been around. So when I sat there, in what I consider squalor, and HE said I was richer than the Sun King of France, my immediate response was, “bullshit.”
So He proceeded to give me a list; indoor plumbing, clean hot and cold water on demand, a daily bath in warm clean water, soap, shampoo, deodorant, flush toilets, refrigeration, air conditioning, heat in winter, a two hundred dollar down comforter, a mattress off the floor, no rats, no mice, antibacterial soap, modern dental care, toothbrushes, toothpaste, fluoride, antibiotics, and that’s just for starters. So that very day, I became grateful for all the many modern miracles and gifts I have each and every day, and most of all I’m grateful for my Leo, my Lion King.
I think when we are looking for life mates, we are looking for someone who will love us in spite of our many shortcomings; B. O., morning breath, flatulence, and wrinkles. When you are twenty five and wrinkle free and everything is perky, and you can still hold up a tube top without artificial support, life is good to you. But after dueling life every day for fifty years or more, you realize that the odds are with the house, and you are not holding a winning hand.
Real love puts the money down not on the house, but with you. Knowing that inspires you to be your best, even if it means you can’t quite pack a pair of jeans like you did in high school, and you are not a Nobel Prize winner, you’re just a working slob barely making ends meet at the end of each pay period.
After my accident Leo used to say that I was like an orchid, that I was fragile and needed special care. He did his best to take care of me until I recovered enough to go back to school and back to work. I used to tell him that he was like a rose bush. Tough, thorny, and the more shit you piled on the stronger he would get. Recently Leo has changed his opinion about me. After seeing the obstacles I have overcome and how I just get stronger and tougher she has decided that we are both a couple of desert roses. Despite drought, pests, stupid gardeners, freezing temperatures, relentless sun, we are stronger than ever.
So what is love really? Love means saying you’re sorry and meaning it, making amends, and not doing it again. Love means respecting the one who loves you and being someone respectable. Just like the old Tammy Wynette song, “Stand by Your Man”, you have to stand by the special someone you love. Being tough enough to get through whatever life throws at you, and soft enough to be kind to each other is a primary requirement. The other main ingredient is to have a sense of humor, because sometimes that is the only thing you have going for you. We spend a lot of time laughing, at each other, ourselves and others. Getting too serious could kill you.
I have been looking at our portrait a lot lately, and wondering how I got so lucky. If you believe in destiny then it was meant to be. I believe in a cosmic committee of old women, who get their yayas by sending us off on a wild goose chase we call our lives. As I look backward at my life I can see where at each turn in the road their guidance lead me to where I am today. Sometimes gently and sometimes not so gently, and sometimes downright painful. But I’m grateful, very grateful to be where I am today. I can proudly say I’ve become a Desert Rose.
Me and Leo * 1993 to 2009