Eating Like an Ausey

This is the last piece I have written that I will post on here, so everything after this post will be new stuff. Which means it may be awhile, but I'll try. Contrary to popular belief, I don't just sit at my computer all day writing essays and poems and such. Each on of these pieces I've posted are evidence of weeks of stress and sweat and pain and irritation and moments of nearly tossing my computer out the window. Writing is hard work. It never just comes, and when it does, it is usually among the first thing to be thrown out on first revision.

I wrote "Eating Like an Ausey" for my creative writing class last winter semester. I don't know that it's my finest writing, but it was one of those "inspired" pieces that I wrote the night before it was due.

"Eating Like an Ausey"

I’ve been taught from the time I was in nursery that family history work is among the most important ingredients in building God’s kingdom. I didn’t think too much about it, for I figured quite a bit of my work had already been done by my relatives, and I’ve always felt I was doing my part to live up to my family’s heritage. It wasn’t until I took one look my mom’s pedigree chart that I realized how little I know about a unique line on her mom’s side of the family.

To look at me, one would think all my family comes from Europe. Perhaps it is my pale skin, freckles, red hair, and blue eyes. A large portion of my family, however, traces back to Lebanon only three generations before me: the Ausey’s. They were one of the few Christian Lebanese in their day, which created much turmoil for them, yet they refused to deny their strong belief in Christ. My great-great-great-grandfather hid the family Bible under the floorboards in the porch to save it from the Lebanese soldiers who were burning all the Bibles in Lebanon. My great-great-grandfather sought religious freedom and wanted to come to the United States so badly that he stowed away on a ship bound for America. He only got as far as Turkey before he was found and kicked off the ship. There he worked until he gained passage to America. In North Dakota, by now in his twenties, he bought land and earned money, then sent for his betrothed. She came to America at the age of thirteen without knowing a word of English to marry a man she hardly knew and didn’t like. She had three children, one of whom was Sophie, who married and had five children. One of the five was Yvonne, who married and had Annette, my mother. Through this line the Lebanese recipes have been passed, some of which, particularly the fataya and cabbage rolls, haven’t been written down in years.

A frequent reminder of my Lebanese ancestry comes when my mother cooks one or more of the several Lebanese dishes that have been passed down through my family for generations. These meals have become such a regular part of my life that I sometimes forget the significance they hold.

Kibbi is a main Lebanese dish that slightly resembles meatloaf. It is usually made with lamb, though through the ages, our family recipe has adapted to the American culture and now calls for beef. Mom also swears the meat was eaten raw, but while my family gets meat from the local grocery store and not from a cow they raised themselves, we stick with cooking the meat before we serve it. Although I don’t like walnuts, kibbi is the one food I can eat without picking the walnuts out one by one. Mom has always made sure the kibbi is full of walnuts, probably to keep us from bothering to waste so much time separating the meat from the nuts. The walnuts hardly bear any flavor, however, because the cinnamon mixed with the meat has such a strong flavor. Strange, I know—beef and cinnamon. But kibbi is not kibbi without cinnamon.

For some strange reason, Mom has always cut the kibbi diagonally so that the pieces of meat are not square like a piece of cake, but rather take the shape of a diamond.

“Why do you have to cut it like that?” I asked not even a year ago.

“I don’t know,” Mom replied. “That’s just how we’ve always done it.”

And perhaps that is the answer to how we cook most of our favorite Lebanese dishes.

Steaming ground beef mixed with onions and garlic, hidden inside a triangular pillow of fluffy, golden bread—this is fataya. The juices of the meat create a kind of gravy and soak into the bread so that even after the meat is eaten, the bread still tastes of beef, garlic, and onions. The bread is so soft that I rub it against my lips before taking a bite; it is like a baby’s cheek—round, smooth, unscathed by hungry jaws. Although each fataya is slightly larger than my palm, I cannot make myself eat just one. Each time we make fataya I eat three or four, and even then my mouth is never satisfied. Dad squirts ketchup on each bite, but I eat it plain, for I have heard that the Lebanese prefer the taste of the herbs, seasonings, and fresh ingredients to the sauces and dips of many other cultures’ foods.

Several meals my mom has cooked over the years have included Lebanese food without me even realizing it. I would have never thought, for instance, that cabbage rolls would be Lebanese. Dad’s mom always made cabbage rolls she called halukis, but I always knew them to be Yugoslavian. They were big, about the size of a sub sandwich roll, and packed with bitter herbs that always made me gag in my youth. I would eat them every Christmas just because everyone talked about how good they were, but I never liked them. Mom’s cabbage rolls were different, however. Lebanese cabbage rolls are small—the size of a finger—and, like many of the Lebanese dishes my mom makes, contain a hint of cinnamon.

“They’re supposed to be made with grape leaves,” Mom tells me every time she makes cabbage rolls. “That’s how my grandma used to make them.” Mom wraps the meat and bulgur wheat in cabbage and squishes them in a pot as I watch, taking mental notes so that one day I can make cabbage rolls just like her.

Of all the Lebanese dishes Mom makes, the most common is lubia and rice. As a little girl, I hated the chunks of tomatoes in the lubia, and I hated green beans, yet I always said I loved lubia because it was Lebanese food. Whenever Mom made lubia and rice, I’d pick out the chunks of hamburger to eat, and then sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on my rice, a tradition that stemmed from my Russian ancestors. Years later I acquired a taste for the lubia, and I stopped dousing my rice in cinnamon and sugar, but even still I did not eat the meal the way it was meant to be eaten. My lubia always went beside my rice, never on top the way the rest of my family would eat it. Although I would put both dishes on my fork at once to eat them together, I never put my lubia on top of the rice.

“Why do you eat it that way?” Mom would ask every time we had lubia and rice and for dinner.

“I don’t know,” I reply. “That’s just the way I’ve always done it.”

I have learned that in Arabic bread is called “esh,” which means “life.” All Lebanese meals include bread, which is quite often flat bread, like a pita pocket. Unless fataya is part of the meal, we eat our Lebanese food with pocket bread, which, although it doesn’t have much flavor, it is one of my favorite types of bread. It sometimes serves as a kind of utensil for lubia and rice or kibbi. But more often than using it as a means to eat some of our favorite Lebanese dishes, we spread peanut butter between the folds of the bread. Mom refuses to participate in such a ritual, swearing that “Grandma is rolling in her grave right now.” The tradition of peanut butter in the pocket bread during a Lebanese meal started with my grandfather, but it has somehow seeped into our family and taken root so strongly that although peanut butter is not part of Lebanese cuisine, it has become part of our Lebanese heritage.

After the dishes are done and the burners on the stove have been rubbed clean by a scouring pad, the Lebanese food is no more than another meal that Mom makes occasionally. I don’t think of those Lebanese ancestors to whom I owe my life. So what is the point of these family recipes being passed down from generation to generation? What sets the cabbage rolls apart from halukis? What makes kibbi so different from meatloaf? I never understood, nor did I care to ever find out.

Only once I started researching Lebanese recipes on the Internet and showering Mom with questions about my Lebanese ancestry did I realize that the dishes Mom makes are unique to my family. Not one kibbi recipe mirrored my mom’s. I never even found a recipe for cabbage rolls, and the fataya recipes I found don’t compare to my family’s recipe. But these recipes were passed down to Mom from Grammy, who got them from Grandma Sophie, who got them from her mother. The legacy of unique Lebanese food continues in my family even now.

Without realizing it, every time I eat Lebanese food, I am eating religious freedom. I am burying my Bible in my porch. I am stowing away on a ship. I am marrying a man I do not know or love. But I am doing it for posterity.

Personal Soliloquy

In twelfth grade, my English class read Hamlet. To this day, I think it might be my favorite Shakespeare play, though Much Ado About Nothing is right up there as well. But I'm not talking about that one just now. Hamlet features several soliloquies, or private monologues. As one of our writing assigments, my teacher had us write our own soliloquies. Some of the wording is a little awkward, but that is because we were encouraged to use partial quotes from Hamlet.

"Personal Soliloquy"
Some mornings, I wake up screaming,
but it’s not because I’ve had a bad dream or I’m not looking forward to the day,
or because I’m hurt. I just scream because I feel like screaming.
As I dress for school, I open my drawers to reveal the hundreds of clothing combinations I could make.
I try them all on to see which one is just right, but decide that none of them are right
and I might as well wear the same thing I wore the day before.
Should I wear my gray sweats, my blue sweats, or my jeans?
My sweats are obviously more comfortable, but they can get awfully hot.
So after I finally decide the gray sweats will do just fine, I head out for the day.
Am I thinking about my agenda for the day? I am not.
Am I thinking about what I ate for dinner the night before? I am not.
Am I thinking about how I didn’t finish my homework, but I really needed to because I won’t have any time to finish it during first period? I am not.
Instead, my thoughts are so deep, so complex, so intelligent and wise that, should they be spoken, they would sound like, “AHHHHHHHHHH!”
All through the day, these thoughts run through my head.
They swirl and twirl and confuse all other thoughts that try to enter.
Some people take me for a quiet, shy girl, but that’s only because they don’t see.
I am anything but that, because everything inside me is actually screaming.
The only reason I don’t let it all out is that someone would surely say,
“Something is rotten in the state of Lindsey’s mind.”
That someone would be right, for in my mind are so many thoughts,
there are so many emotions that mix together and drive me mad.
Lindsey? Rotten in her mind? Oh, absolutely. She has absolutely gone mad.
She is convinced that the Harry Potter books are one hundred percent factual,
and that the only reason she hasn’t been sent an acceptance letter from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is because her owl was intercepted by a dementor.
She believes that the food pyramid is actually a sphere that includes ten major food groups,
but the food groups change according to one’s appetite and cravings.
Yes, Chex Mix is its own food group, as is Mrs. Dash and chicken alfredo pizza.
She believes wholeheartedly that money does grow on trees,
and that Donald Trump and Bill Gates are really poor farmers of money trees as opposed to big business billionaires.
She assumes you are guilty until proven innocent and, no matter what people say,
Hitler would have been an okay guy if he’d abandoned his plan to take over the world
and aspired to open his own beauty salon.
And, above all, she is certain that only her madness would cause her to talk to herself in third person about things that make absolutely no sense.
Is there a method to her madness? Perhaps,
But probably not.

Yipee!

Just got my final grades, and it looks like all that painfully hard work and excruciating stress paid off. So, to celebrate, I'm posting possibly my favorite piece of writing. I would like to dedicate it to Milady Tennille DeAutumn, she knows who she is. I would be surprised if many other people really understood it. So I'll briefly explain.
Back in the days of Colonial 501 (my old apartment) there was this infomercial on called "70s Music Explosion," starring Barry Williams (Greg Brady). After a night or two of flipping through the channels, only to find nothing else remotely entertaining, "70s Music Explosion" quickly became our favorite show. And when I say favorite, I mean we even recorded it so we could watch it when it wasn't on.
In honor of Barry and Colonial 501, I wrote this "experimental" piece (in other words, it doesn't fit into another genre). Basically, it's a stream of consciousness while I'm watching "70s Music Explosion."
And so to Barry, and to Milady Tennille DeAutumn...
Love, Your Mother Captain Delta Dawn

Night with Barry
Screaming. I can’t help myself. I’ve been waiting for weeks to see it again. I know I’m addicted, and nothings ever going to come from it, but I still can’t control myself. I pop the tape in. Sure, it’s not at the beginning, but that’s okay. I’ll always remember which tape it is. I only missed five minutes. My roommates will be proud.
Carl Douglas is a brave soul: a black man wearing a Kung Fu outfit and doing karate chops. No thank you.
And what’s up with Paper Lace? Wonderful song, but what’s with the afro and beard? Isn’t that going a little over the top?
And there’s Terry singing his heart out. This one is my favorite! “We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun, but the hills that we climbed were just seasons out of time!”
Oh, the testimonials. None of them probably really cared about music at that time. They were still too young, but yet now they claim to love it. What kind of testimonial is that? I bet they were paid!
There’s my man! Why did Erica Shaffer get that role? It should have been me! I’m sorry I can’t be with you Barry. I know it’s hard, sweetheart, but the show must go on. Way to be brave!
Nice glasses, Elton. And that crock’s really rockin’. Obviously real…NOT!
“Rock me gently, rock me slowly, take it easy don’t you know.” Andy Kim would be handsome if he didn’t resemble a wolverine.
“Beach baby beach baby give me your hand. Give me something that I can remember.” I’ll never forget you, First Class.
Barry, way to stick it to the man. You’re doing wonderfully.
Of course Cher would be there. “Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves.” Is she singing about herself for trying to steal my poor Barry’s heart?
“She’s a lady.” I don’t think you’re talking about Cher, are you Tom? You can do better than that!
“Bad (bad) blood (blood).” That would be awesome to be known as “Neil Sedaka’s echo.” Did he get paid a lot to do that? He should have. That’s what makes the whole thing worth it.
Why is their name Blue Swede anyway? He’s wearing a dorky leather cape! But all is forgiven. He’s just “hooked on a feeling. I’m high on believing that you’re in love with me!” That song’s dedicated from me to you, Barry!
“In 1976 we all got out on the dance floor and started to shake, shake, shake with KC and the Sunshine Band.”
One of the best songs ever. “Shake shake shake. Shake shake shake. Shake your booty! Shake your booty!”
“You sexy thing…” That one’s definitely for Barry.
“Delta Dawn what’s that flower you have on? Could it be a faded rose from days gone by?” How the heck does Helen move her torso like that? NICE TORSO! I wish I could dance like that. I would definitely be cool if I looked like her.
I didn’t even know “Rock and Roll Heaven” was on here because we’re always laughing too hard at Helen. Good to know.
Why does Harry Chapin always look so scary? He must have been some kind of demented person. But “Cat’s in the Cradle” is a classic, so I’ll forgive him. I can’t think of Harry Chapin without thinking of Dad listening to his Harry Chapin CDs over and over and over and over and over…I don’t know if I have enough over’s in there.
Carly, I love your song, especially since it reminds me so much of “How to Lose a Guy…” which reminds me of Matthew. But don’t worry Barry. I’ll always love you. No man can ever come between us.
What’s up with the tight yellow pants and Hawaiian shirt? I can get over the shirt, but you’re a full-grown man! You’re not a yellow pants kind of guy!
I think Michael Murphey spends more time doing his hair than I do. How does he get that shoulder-length hair to curl under so well? How does he make it stay?
“I love that song.” You would Erica…trying to steal my man! The nerve!
“Sky High” is a good one, but I think Jigsaw could do with a new wardrobe.
“That’s the night that the lights went out in Georgia.” If I didn’t know any better, I’d think she was Carrie Fisher. But she’s not. And Reba’s rendition is so much better. This lady has some serious issues.
“Oh oh oh it’s magic, you know! Never believe it’s not so!”
“Love, love will keep us together. Think of me babe whenever.” I’m Captain, And’s Tennille, but for some reason, I always get us mixed up. I have so many nicknames it’s hard to keep them all straight!
And there’s Chicago, who’s Ashley. “Saturday in the park, I think it was the forth of July.” You were right. It was the fourth of July!
If I order now with a credit card, I get free shipping and handling. I should just go for it. I want it, but it’s just so expensive! I don’t know if I can convince everyone to go in on it with me. But if I could afford it, I would buy it in a heartbeat. I don’t have to eat the rest of the semester, right?
Terry, you’re my fave. Just thought I’d let you know. Again.
“Oh it never rains in Southern California.” Well, maybe they shouldn’t ever go to Washington, then.
Why is Catherine Buell so stuck in the 70s? And who is she anyway? She’s annoying really. No one’s ever heard of her anyway.
“We’ve gotta get right back to where we started from.”
“It’s fun to stay at the Y-M-C-A!” Those Village People sure know how to move!
“Midnight at the oasis. Sing your camel to sleep.” What kind of lyrics are those? Did someone get paid to write them?
“So many of my favorite songs came from really cute guys!”
“You make me feel like dancing! We’re gonna dance the night away! You make me feel like dancing!” Leo, you may be even more favorite than Terry! I’m sorry Terry, but Leo just has the moves! And that hair! I don’t know why Erica thinks you’re so cute, but I think you could grow on me. Not that I’d love you any less, Barry.
Alan O’Day is anything but cute. Why was he put in this category? Somebody needs to lay off the booze for a little while.
“If you like piña coladas and getting caught in the rain. If you’re not into Yoga—” Whatever Rupert. Why are you singing this song if you’re wearing a sweater, button-up shirt, khakis, and nerdy glasses? How do you explain the missionary do?
“These songs really take me back. Finally, we have a collection that captures all the fun, all the excitement, and all the variety of the 70s.” Barry, I love you’re little head bob. And I’ve never seen such facial expression.
1-800-583-9950. I could call now and get the two bonus CDs. It really is a great deal, but how am I to justify it? I want to support Barry, I love the music, but I don’t know if I can fork out that much money.
“Drift Away” is classic. There should be more songs like that.
“Oh what a night! Late December back in ’63.” I wonder what happened on that night. I probably don’t want to know. If they made a movie about it, it’d probably be rated R.
“I can tell you there’s never been anything like it. I’m Barry Williams.” Enter adorable squinty-eyed smile and head bob. Turn to leave, then pivot on the right foot and gaze back into my eyes. “Enjoy the music.”
Oh, I will.

Finishing Four

Remember those insane days when I thought I could run cross country? Turns out the only thing I really got out of it was writing material.

"Finishing Four"

Grayish-brown dust particles drifted up my nose and down the back of my neck where they clung to the sweat. A thousand little forks gouged the inside of my stomach. Mexican jumping beans bounced atop my full bladder. Dry sand coated the inside of my throat. I hoped that if I sat still enough the ground would suck me down into the dark brown dirt. Mom stood beside me as she had always stood beside three of my older siblings at their meets. They too had run on the Rogers High School cross country team and had proven the Kay family to be good runners—or at least to have good attitudes—a feat I had yet to accomplish. This was my last opportunity to prove myself, to set a personal record, to come in some other place than second to last.

Why did I do this? Was I trying to prove something? Did it have something to do with “upholding the family honor,” as Disney princess Mulan put it? After four years on the cross country team, the only thing I had to show was a pair of ratty, holey, beaded running shoes. The beads came from the coaches for joining the team; completing races; running “Monster Hill” and “Armpit,” two of the biggest, most treacherous hills in Puyallup; attending the annual Breakfast Run; and, perhaps more coveted than the beads given for first place, donating blood to our course—if you fall while running and start bleeding, you get the Blood Bead, a red heart that holds the topmost position on my shoelaces, right next to the small yellow string given to us after practice on September 11, 2001. But I could hardly say I did it for the beads. How many people want to walk around school bragging about beaded shoelaces? Maybe in first grade.

“Are you ready?” Mom said nonchalantly, but I couldn’t speak for fear of losing my lunch.

As Coach Lynch shot the five-minute warning gun, girls from three different teams clumped together near the starting line and began stripping down to their singlets and shorts. Boys from each team collected the girls’ warm-ups and sweatshirts. The fastest runners jumped to the front of the line, rolling their shoulders and jogging in place. The slower runners slumped to the back of the crowd and pretended, unconvincingly, to stretch like the others. I was among the latter group. As I stood, all the saliva I had managed to collect instantly fled my mouth. I awkwardly climbed out of my warm-ups and stood for a second or two, my face set and sullen. Before I had a chance to get in starting position, the gunshot blasted through the air, and my feet began moving automatically. The crowd of cheering parents, siblings, friends, teachers, and teammates rang through the school grounds, but I heard none of it. My only thought was, “I can’t do this for the next half hour.”

In the middle of the massive herd of girls I ran. One passed me. Soon another, and then another. As I sprinted around the first corner on the track, I glanced back hoping to see a horde of girls, but found I was last. Ahead, one by one, girls disappeared as they turned off the track and onto the course that wound through fields of tall, tan-colored grass, then over the “camel back,” a mountainous hill of trees and bushes. I gulped back the lump of ping-pong balls that began forming in the back of my throat as I trotted into the tall grass. I wanted to cry partly because I knew there was no hope for me to be as good as my siblings and partly because my energy had dissipated in the first two hundred meters. My back ached and my muscles tore. And I still had two miles left to go. “I can’t finish this race even with a walker,” I thought miserably to myself.

The sun vanished behind thick gray clouds, and small pellets of Washington water parachuted down to wet the dust that had collected on my face, legs, and head. My cheeks couldn’t tell the difference between the raindrops and the tears that started leaking from my eyes. Rather than dirt clouding in my wake, mud gummed on my shoes and sloshed up onto my back. I willed myself up the camel back, and then let the descent carry me down to the track. With only three hundred meters left I began thrusting my arms out as far as they would reach, grabbing at the air in front of me as if to pull me toward the finish line. Instantly, with the larger movement of my arms, my steps also began growing larger and faster. In a great eruption of adrenaline, I dashed down the track, my feet pounding into the black rubber, my arms swinging in front of my body, my lungs filling with and releasing gulps of cold oxygen in perfect synchronization with my steps, my insides writhing with pain. With all my energy focused on moving me steadily toward the end of my final race, I could hardly keep my eyes open as I gained speed. Every three steps, I allowed my eyes to close for four. The finish line got closer, but the screaming crowd seemed to be farther away from me than the sun. At last both feet crossed the white painted line. In ten steps I slowed to a walk. My side throbbed as I dry-heaved a dozen times. Every ounce of energy completely gone, my legs collapsed.

“I’m proud of you for finishing that race,” Mom said as she scooped her arm under me, though she looked more worried than proud.

“I…came in…last,” I said hoarsely between breaths.

“That’s okay. You finished. You did well.”

Although I wanted to believe Mom, I couldn’t. Merely finishing the race should have been enough, but it wasn’t. I wanted to be proud of myself for completing four years of a sport I hated, but I didn’t. I forced a smile and walked one hundred yards through the gravel parking lot to my car, unnoticed by the rest of my team as they cheered for the three fastest runners.

"Born a Kay"

Many of you have probably already heard this poem, but here it is if you haven't. I wrote this poem for my poetry class this last semester...it was the only poem I wrote the entire semester. I don't write much poetry, but here is one of the few poems I've written.

Born a Kay

A name will be passed from one to another
As the seventh miracle enters the womb.
Seven, yes, but only fifth to survive.
The youngest,
A breech, and the mother
with a liver condition to make it
Stillborn.

A day late,
Slightly underdeveloped
Blood sugar low—
But she breathes.
And for this girl
The name is placed,
Though not temporarily.

One day the name will be bumped to the middle
To take the place of a name left out.
A sign, it will stand, to pronounce
That her past is not left behind,
But rather a part
Of who she is.
A Kay.

The red hair—
The blue eyes—
The pale skin—
The ample freckles—
The wide hips—
The short height—
All point to her family.

She can’t hide who she is
a Kay—
Pure.
Happy.
Rejoicing.
Is this what she stands for?
She tries.

Though circumstance will change her,
Some element of the past
Will forever remain.
Will she drop the name when another arrives?
Never! No, not ever!
Instead, a symbol of all she’s done
And all she’s become.

A name will be passed from one to another.
She breathes!

I MADE IT!

Yes, today was the last day of the Fall 2007 Semester! Actually, it's kind of a surreal moment. I'm not sure how I feel about it just yet. But the projects are done, turned it, and being graded as I type (maybe not--I don't know what teacher grades at 9:00 at night on the last Friday of the semester?).

Enjoy this Holiday Season! I know I will!

Out Back

I've had quite a few people ask about the essay I wrote and then read at the BYU-Idaho Pre-Professional Conference. So, I guess this is a good place to put something like that. Easily accessible for all.


Out Back

The Japanese Maple
The red lacy leaves cast pink shadows on my bare, freckled arms and legs. I sit on a soft mattress of dead leaves from the past several years. When was the last time anyone raked under here? It’s impossible to say. Three flat cement slabs stacked on top of each other the width and length of cinderblocks serve as the perfect throne in my Japanese maple palace. I am queen over the land of Backyard, and my servants are the baby spiders the size of grains of sand. My soldiers are the black ants that aren’t much bigger than the baby spiders. My field hands are the potato bugs that are as big as my pinkie nail.

Next to me sits a tiny plastic tea cup—cream with a small pink flower painted on one side—and a matching plate. The cup holds two tablespoons of rainwater from the wheelbarrow that sits beside the house. Specks of dirt float to the top, pieces of beauty bark and tiny rocks sink to the bottom. I pretend to sip the water, letting it touch my lips and run down my chin to absorb into my pastel pink Ariel and Eric T-shirt. I put the cup back on its plate and wipe my lips clean with the back of my hand.

I stand. I am the only one in my family short enough to stand in the Japanese maple palace. I am seven. The top of the dome branches barely graze my head, working as a comb on my copper hair. I look up through the thick branches and leaves. Too thick to see the sky, I gently spread them apart with my fingers.

“Yup. Looks like rain,” I say, though no one is there to hear me. “I better gather enough food for the rainy season.”

I don’t know how I know when the “rainy season” is, for every season in Western Washington is rainy season. I part the wall of leaves and prickly branches and run to the deck to get a Cool Whip bowl that had held apple slices earlier in the day. Just off the deck is a planter box with a small patch of chives poking up through the sienna brown dirt. I grab a handful, throw them into the bowl, and run back to my palace in just enough time to evade the first signs of raindrops.

“It’s a real feast,” I say as I eat the chives. I don’t particularly like them, but they are edible, which is good enough for me.

Outside my little fortress the rain gets heavier, beating down all around me. For a few seconds I am safe, but as the leaves get wet and begin to sag, my roof leaks and wets my hair.

Trampoline Games
“Marco!”

“Polo!”

I am kneeling in the center of the trampoline with my eyes closed. My four cousins Jason, Brianne, Nicole, and Pamela, and my sister Stephanie surround me. I can feel their every move, but I can’t tell where they are. The July sun has already fallen behind the trees, homes, and fences that surround my backyard, but the air is still thick, heavy, muggy. “Marco!” I yell.

“Polo!” everyone responds, but I still can’t tell exactly where they are. I thrust my body to the left, but no one is there. I lunge forward, but once again, I do not touch anyone. Someone moves behind me, but I barely miss his or her leg. Nicole giggles, but I can’t tell from which direction she is laughing.

“Marco!”

“Jason, Brianne, Nicole, it’s time to go,” Aunt Nancy hollers from the deck above us. They protest, but Aunt Nancy shakes her head. “No, we have to get up early tomorrow for baseball.”

Stephanie, Pamela, and I are left, but Marco Polo isn’t nearly as fun with only three. Soon Pamela, too, leaves. Stephanie joins the adults in the living room—it happens more and more as she approaches her thirteenth birthday, now only a month away, and wants to feel older. Although I am nine and we still have much in common, she likes to pretend that she is a great deal older and wiser than me.

The shadows in the backyard become larger and the sky deepens to a navy. I get off the trampoline and lay beneath it on the cool grass. I feel more out here than inside where, even with four fans blowing, the humid air reaches ninety degrees. I pinch the grass in my toes and spread my arms out wide, then turn to lie on my stomach. The blades of grass tickle my nose and cheeks, but I just lay there, absorbing the cool, clean scent of the freshly cut lawn.

Rocket’s Red Glare
The fog is thick, but we can still see to the other side of the yard. The Kay and Bryan girls huddle together on the deck while we wait to welcome the year two thousand. This year will be busy. I will become a teenager. Justin will return from his mission to Los Angeles in April, Aaron will go on his mission the week after to Tokyo. But that is only if we make it through this New Year’s Eve alive.

Aaron sits on the roof, waiting to “drop the ball,” which is really a glow-in-the-dark Nerf football on a string that reaches from the chimney to a rock on the opposite end of our backyard. Brother Bryan has a “fireworks” show, which is really two dozen model rocket engines wired to a board that spell out Y2K. He has spent all afternoon working on the presentation, which has only expanded his ego and made him giddier as the clock ticks toward midnight.

I can see my breath in the night, and a shiver spreads through my body. Only a minute left. Soon, thirty seconds. Finally Aaron drops the ball. It bounces slowly down the rope. Around us, neighbors are setting off fireworks and singing choruses of “Auld Lang Syne,” but we are still waiting for our ball to reach the end of the rope. At last it arrives, but our light show does not go off. Brother Bryan and Dad, disappointed, realize the battery to set off the display isn’t strong enough.

I hear the roar of an engine as Aaron pulls the Jeep into the backyard. The fireworks around us have stopped, but the Kay and Bryan girls are still clutching each other in the cold January air.

“No, Kevin. Not the car,” Mom says, but Dad doesn’t seem to care.

Dad touches the wires to the car battery, and in one giant blast, the rockets spring from the board, never revealing the neatly crafted Y2K, and shoot toward the deck. Eight of us, all girls, dive for the deck as the model engines barely miss our heads and land on the other side of the house.

“Happy New Year!” Brother Bryan shouts jovially. I look at my watch. It’s 12:14.

The Old and the New
Masses of tangled blackberry bushes strangle the practically dead raspberry bushes that separate my yard from the greenbelt behind our house. We haven’t been able to pick raspberries for two years because the thorny blackberry bushes have overtaken almost half of the yard. But Justin, home from his mission this week, is ready to tackle a new kind of devil: the infamous, berryless vines.

I open the sliding door one day to find Justin, machete in hand, swishing back and forth like a samurai warrior. He has been out there all day but has made little progress. Very little. A small patch has been cleared, but he has not yet reached the raspberries. Three days later I spot the poles that once marked the raspberry bushes. All I see is a brown, tangled mess. The blackberries have murdered my raspberries.

Justin spends weeks outside trying to salvage what he can of the once wonderfully landscaped yard, but we soon find there is no hope. Mom and Dad surrender to bulldozers and Rota tillers. We build a gray brick wall stretching almost all the way across the yard so that our backyard now has two levels. An antique barrel and an old hand pump serve as a channel for a small rock waterfall from the top level to the bottom level, where we have a small pond. Dad fills it with goldfish, but they never last long between becoming a delicious snack for our cat, and getting sucked up into the pump.

We keep the three maple trees, including my Japanese maple palace, but we get rid of the apple tree and seven or eight rhododendron bushes. We also demolish our small bird cemetery, where three of our birds were once buried. Painted rocks had even served as headstones, but now the bird corpses are lost and have been covered by a metal shed.

After weeks of sore limbs and dirt-crusted fingernails, the work is done. I miss the old backyard, the one that looked like an exotic jungle, but we are at last able to relax in a beautiful yard without worrying about blackberries conquering the trees and grass. The bulldozers have moved out and the pallets that once held the bricks have been taken to the dump; birds, squirrels, and occasional deer return to find homes in the woods just beyond our property line. We spend our summer nights sitting on our deck next to candles sipping homemade strawberry lemonade, admiring our work, our masterpiece.

October
The large red maple tree in the center of the backyard has become brilliant since the school year began four weeks ago. The yard is littered with leaves, but the trees seem to have millions yet to shed. Mom assigns me the task of raking the backyard, a job normally tedious in the usual Washington rain, but while October just begins, the sun still shines through the leaves. I have four hours of homework to do, a lot for the first month of tenth grade, but I stay outside as long as I can while the sun hangs just above the horizon, refusing to completely disappear.

To and fro, back and forth, I swing the rake as I gather the leaves. There are too many to count. The vibrant yellows and browns and reds and oranges gather to a pile slowly, for I am in no hurry. In my ears the wind whips, but the whistling sounds more like music, and for a few moments I am lost in a trance. I hear the gentle notes of a song I played in band that very morning, “October” it was called, and it is the most beautiful song I have heard. The warm notes seem to manifest themselves in the colorful leaves. The yellow is the euphonium, gentle but bright. The orange is the flute, lively and powerful. The red is the oboe, prominent and warm. The brown is the bass clarinet, my instrument, deep and soothing.

I awake from my dream and see that I am only raking leaves, but it still seems much more than that. The autumn wind pulls a few more leaves from the branches as I finish raking the leaves in a pile in the greenbelt. Although “October” is only in my mind, it connects me to the leaves, to the trees that have grown as I have grown.

Beginning and End
July is normally warm, but this July is unbearable. The muggy air makes breathing nearly impossible, and I can’t contain the sweat dripping from my forehead. My white breathable cotton skirt makes the heat somewhat easier to deal with, but I still feel sticky. Although I am glad it is Saturday and I don’t have to work, I long for the air-conditioned daycare where I teach twelve rambunctious toddlers in order to have enough money to return to BYU-Idaho in the fall.

Small, round tables and plastic chairs from the church building fill our backyard. Guests are all around, sitting, standing, trying desperately to hide from the early afternoon sun in the shade of the trees. On the steps between the lower and upper levels of our backyard sits an archway decorated in white tulle and red and yellow daisies. A path of red and yellow rose petals leads from the deck to the archway. Long rectangular tables on the opposite side of the lawn are piled with fruits, vegetables, cheeses and crackers, punch, bottles of water, and a three-tiered cake. Aaron and Justin stand at the grills, ready to spring into action when called upon.

Stephanie pushes PLAY on her CD player as eight-year-old Sierra walks out of the house, down the deck steps, and to the archway where Brian and Bishop Van Gieson stand. She smiles at Brian, soon to be the only father Sierra has ever known. Sarah follows in her dress of cream and red, a bouquet of yellow and red daisies in her hands. This is the moment we’ve been waiting for. After nearly ten years as a widow my oldest sister is giving her little girl a dad. Tears stream down my cheeks as the sun beats in my eyes, but the sun is not responsible for the tears. My heart swells with excitement and joy at the thought of a new addition to the family.

The ceremony is short; the kiss at the end is long but delicate; and Sarah, Brian, and Sierra all seem to be glowing—and not just from the sweat running down their faces. I realize this is the beginning and the end. It’s the beginning of a new relationship, a new marriage, a new family. It’s the beginning of a new way of life. It’s the end of years of sadness and pain and loneliness. And it’s the end of my adventures in this backyard.

Home
Chlorinated water shimmers in the scorching August sun. At the proper angle I can see excess sunscreen oil floating on the surface, a sure sign that at least one of the pasty Kay kids will burn. Probably me. We haven’t all been together in years. We are no longer children being raised by our parents, though one cannot say we are adults either. More like heathens. Even the so-called “parents” forget civility as they lower themselves down the ladder into the four-foot-deep swimming pool. Ten of us over the age of twenty, though not one capable of acting his or her age. We resort to childish behavior, flipping a switch to “survival of the fittest” mode.

A year has passed since Sarah’s backyard wedding and my parent’s move from Washington to Utah. This backyard is much different from the luscious Washington green. In Washington our yard was enclosed with a dark, rotting fence on one side, but thick green trees and towering rhododendron bushes on the others. Our Utah backyard is fenced in all the way around. Houses and trampolines and pools peek over the fence, making me feel exposed to nosy neighbors. Only a few trees line the fence in sporadic places, and the rest of the yard is grass. Brown, scratchy grass. But as we splash about in the pool, playing “Chicken” on Justin’s and Aaron’s shoulders and creating whirlpools, I try not to think about being in Utah instead of Washington. I’m not ready to accept the change.

“AHH!” Mom screams and flails her arms and legs as Justin hoists her up out of the water. With a grunt, Justin swings her over to Aaron’s open arms. They’re playing catch. Mom is the ball. Though she calls for help, fits of laughter, side-aches, and the possibility of drowning from inability to breathe forbid us from joining the Kay Lifeguard Squad. Sierra, nine, and Talmage, nearly four, stare wide-eyed at the sight, unable to comprehend how anyone could do such a thing to “HoneyGram,” wondering how come their parents don’t jump in to save her.

Finally, Mom says between gasps for breath and bursts of laughter, “Okay! Stop it! Ouch!” Two more tosses, and the boys thrust Mom into the water with a splash. She emerges from the water coughing, but laughing all the same. A knot twists in my gut from laughing so hard.

Our pool play comes to an end as Mom announces we need to get ready to take family pictures. Women in bright pink, men in navy, little girls in purple, little boys in light blue. It had only taken us three hours to find a color pallet, no thanks to Target’s forty-five shades of red and blue and purple and yellow, all in different sizes. We dress in our shirts and khaki pants and attempt to look like we haven’t been playing like barbarians in a swimming pool all afternoon.

Mom reminds us to stand up straight and not to make silly faces, but we can hardly resist when Dad sets the timer on the camera and runs like a fugitive to join the group before the flash. Eventually Mom recruits a neighbor from across the street to take the pictures for us, but now the four grandchildren under the age of four have had enough and have become fussy. Amid the cries and complaints of the grandchildren, the children and spouses cannot be disheartened. We poke fun, pinch, tickle, and tease. Though we try and try, not one of the pictures turns out perfectly.

Through the taunts and laughter and squeals and wails, Sarah says to her nine-year-old daughter, “Why don’t you tell everyone what I told you today?” Sierra’s face flashes magenta and hides her face behind her mom’s arm as fourteen faces look to her. Sarah looks up at the now quiet group and says, “We’re going to have a baby in April!”

Screams from the girls and shouts from the boys echo through the backyard as we embrace one another.

“How are you feeling?”

“Are you sure you’re up for it?”

“It’s been ten years since you’ve been pregnant!”

Everyone has endless comments and questions for the expectant mother. While the girls continue chatting and speculating on the sex of the baby and the precise due date, Dad and Justin get on their hands and knees to inspect a wasp nest under the deck. Brian’s eyes twinkle with mischief as he fills the kiddy pool with water from the hose. He makes eye contact with Stephanie, Sarah and me, and then nods in Dad’s direction. Sinister grins spread across our faces. Brian unleashes the water on Dad’s backside. Instant melee. Water flies across the yard. Dad chases Justin around, somehow not noticing that Justin had nothing to do with the plot.

I pause in the midst of the commotion around me, as though a special effects team has slowed time for me. I watch the scene spread before me—Dad and “the boys” wrestling each other for the hose, Mom and “the girls” trying unsuccessfully to stay relatively dry and keep the grandkids from getting pummeled in the battlefield.

We are in a new backyard, one very different from the one in Washington. But the sounds of twelve Kays and three Sandstroms fill the empty unfamiliarity. But for the first time in a year, I start to feel that perhaps, with time, this new backyard could fulfill the same purpose.

And I am home.