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20 I WANTED TO SEE MOTHER. So IN THE EARLY FALL OF 1994, I WENT HOME to Tallahassee. I got in late on a Friday night and in the morning asked her if she wanted to go down to the beach. We didn't talk much along the way. Since Dad's death I'd talked to her only on those days when I felt a little happy or encouraged. Now I wasn't sure if she was thinking about me, or Dad, or the roadside scenery. We arrived at the beach at midmorning. I parked the car under the shade of an old crab-apple tree. The cabin still sat on the dune as I remembered, squatting silently, as if contemplating a history of seasons. Arriving here with Mother at my side felt both familiar and strange. I couldn't remember the last time she and I had come here. Whenever that was we had been strangers. I held so many secrets inside me that she had not even existed, not as my mother. But now we were here together. We got out of the car, she like a white gardenia, full of softness, no expectations but simple calm, just here with me, open and loving, placid, my blue-eyed mother. At seventy-one she still had a perfect complexion, hair the color of mist. She held no contrivances or affectations; she had aged honestly, a Southern lady who knew who she was. We took our shoes off and walked slowly down the dune path to the beach. "My goodness," she said, looking around, "this is nice." She faced me for a moment, and I thought, she's looking for some sign of happiness. I wonder if it's there. I wonder if I'm happy or if something's still wrong with me. I gave Mother a half smile and looked away. I felt uneasy, as if I needed to say something, but I didn't know what it should be. We walked toward the creek. When I was a little boy, a trip to the creek took forever. But we were already there at the bank, looking for a place to cross. Copyrighted Material 133 A hundred tiny sandpipers on the other side pecked the shore. We wet our feet in the cold water, tiptoeing through the creek. The birds suddenly ran, flying into the air. We watched them as they circled around back of us. We headed on toward the marsh, another mile to the west. Sand fleas jumped around our ankles, but they didn't bite. I didn't know what vein of thought to take. All I knew was here we are. Mother turned and looked into me, as if she was trying to recognize a mood, or notice a scar, or see how far my hairline had receded. I realized, well, she'd never really seen me before. I was her new baby, a son aged and young. A dog came limping up. His hind leg was bent, hardly touching the ground. I saw a wound on his skin. He was old, a golden retriever alone on the beach. He came up to me and I reached down and patted him on the side. He ran up to the sea oats and grabbed a stick in his mouth and brought it back to me. I could hear his lungs; they had fluid in them and I thought he might have pneumonia. But he wanted to play, so I threw the stick. He fetched it and dashed back to me as best he could, tail wagging. I threw it twice again, and each time he came back, giving me the stick and rousing for another throw. Mother looked at me. I looked at her. We grinned, because we both had the same thought, that we were being visited by someone from our past. The dog put his paws on my side. I laughed. I didn't realize it until Mother and I talked later, but I had not smiled in her presence since I was a teenager. But now she saw it, the relief in a son she had so faithfully waited for. The white sand stretched out to sea, the birds cried, the sky streamed around us. Suddenly, there were no shadows, just a ship in the distance. We watched it, slow and gray, until it was time to go. Copyrighted Material ...
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