But Why Mom?

 "But why mom?" It was a common refrain. We'd been on the road for a week and there was still two weeks ahead of us before we'd reach Costa Rica. Sure today we were parked, at a beautiful beach in Mexico but tomorrow we'd be leaving again for another 12 plus hours of driving on narrow coast roads. After two days on the road my oldest had had enough of the whole trip, she hadn't wanted to come before they started and she'd made that clear but I'd talked her into it. "I mean why couldn't we fly like everyone else?"

"Because we aren't like everyone else."

"I want to be like everyone else. Why do you have to do this to me? Why can't we live in the same house, in the same country just like everyone else?" These weren't new questions and since my previous answers of "Because we can't", "Because this was the easiest way to bring the cats, dogs and stuff" or the standard "It'll be fine dear" weren't going to work this time I knew I needed a new answer before the rest of the day's driving was conducted in angry silence.

"Sorry baby, I can't help it. I need to do this. We have to move and we don't do things like everyone else does them. I'm sorry sweetie but you come from a long line of non-conformists."

"What?" snarled the 9 year old not ready to be placated by a word she didn't know.

"Conformity is where everything is the same. You know like when you make cookies and they are all the same shape and size, they conform to what you want them to be. Well non-conformity is where you are different than everyone else. Where you don't try to do things the same as everyone else, where you don't try to be the same as everyone else."
 
She thought momentarily, then nodded a serious nod. "Yep I get it, like Grandma and you being nuts."

Trust my daughter. Well it wasn't like she wasn't right, and I'd never discouraged her from being truthful, even painfully truthful. "Well maybe but actually it's bigger than all that." I motioned her to come and we walked out into the setting sun. Molly the over sized puppy followed us and so did Lisa my watchful shadow. "Come on."

I wanted to be able to talk to her in private, without her sister interrupting, without my parents butting in. It seemed like she and I never had enough time together these days and when we were together we seemed to rub up against each other rather than just talk. Every conversation seemed to become an argument and every discussion a screaming match. She was growing up and growing away and although I was happy to see her grow up I still wanted to keep my little girl as long as I could. I put an arm around her shoulder. It was strange that I could do this now, it wasn't that long ago when if I wanted to be close to her I would just pick her up and carry her but she was too big for that now. She was up to my chin now and measuring herself against me whenever she had a chance just waiting for the day when she lined herself up against me and was bigger than me.

We sat down on the sand and watched the sunset to the right of us while the lights of Acapulco lit up to our left, like a big star was burning out and small stars were fighting to fill the void it had left. The dogs ran around like crazy while the waves crashed in front of us with ceaseless fury and our dogs ran like puppies chasing each other up and down the sand. We sat on the sand facing the pounding ocean the sand was still warm beneath us letting out the heat it had accumulated during the day. And I started to talk, slowly, she'd heard some of these stories, but never like this, never in context.

"I can only tell you about the non-conformists you came from my love as far back as the stories I know, so only as far back as your great-great grandparents, they were all a little crazy.

"Jeannie McPherson was my great grandmother, your great-great Grandmother, Grandma Cherry's grandma and when I was young, a baby, I don't remember it but I have a photo of it, she met me and held me in her arms. 

"She was born in Scotland, in the highlands, and the story goes that she fell in love with Thomas Hunter. Now Thomas was a lowland Scott, from the flat lands of Scotland and her family did not approve of him. He had no money and no position. So he left Scotland to make money and a future in New Zealand. A few months later he sent her a letter to tell him where to meet her and Jeannie McPherson said goodbye to her family and friends. 

"She sailed all the way to New Zealand to meet her love. Now in those days sailing to New Zealand was a long and dangerous trip, much more dangerous that just driving through Central America, it took six months. Some of the boats never arrived and were lost in storms at sea, there were outbreaks of diseases on board, people were born and people died while the boats slowly creaked their way down to New Zealand. And once you were there there was no turning back and changing your mind, the trip back was much worse, you had to go around the notorious Cape of Good Hope where many many boats were destroyed every year in storms.

"Now Jeannie knew all this. She knew that she was saying goodbye to her family forever, that she was going all the way to the end of the world to meet up with a man in a strange country where, at that time, the natives were still dangerous. And she did it, on her own she was 18 years old.

"Now obviously Jeannie was a tough chick right from the beginning and not one that followed like a sheep and did what other people were doing just because they were doing it. She had only one child who survived, grandma Cherry's father, Donald McPherson Hunter, and I believe he was always just a little scared of his mother. She was a tiny little thing but when she said that was the way it was going to be God help anyone who tried to stop her.

"When she was 80 the town decided to plant palm trees down both sides of the main entrance to town. They planted one right outside her house and she decided she didn't like it, it blocked her sun. So she picked up her ax and she went and cut it down. The town came and replanted another one, so she cut that down too. After that the town waited, they waited for her to die. But she didn't hurry in order to make it easier for them, she finally died at 96, and to this day when you drive down that main street one of the palm trees is much smaller the others."
 
She nodded, she'd heard that story enough times it was part of family legend. "Yeah so Grandma comes from crazy old people, that makes sense, so..."

"So it's not just Grandma's family. The last time I was in New Zealand I spoke to my Uncle Peter, he was telling me about grandad Ed's grandfather. Your great-great granddad. He had three sons, the youngest one Kenneth grew up and married your great-grandma Eve but Kenneth was born in England. When he was two years old his father sold everything and moved his family from their farm in England. Uncle Peter's been doing all the research but he had a nice farm in Devon, a good life. Peter even found a record of all the things he sold when he left England. You know how we sold all our things when we left LA?"

"Yep, even my bike."

"Well 100 years earlier your ancestor was doing the same thing. He had a big auction, there was a list of all the items and they were all auctioned off. He even owned two cameras which were both auctioned off, so we know he must have had some money back in those days because a camera was an expensive item. There's a photo that survives of the house, your great-grandfather called it the manor house, but it wasn't really a manor house, just a farm house but he told everyone differently. Anyway his life was good in England he'd just gotten this farm, he was doing fine, yet for no reason my Uncle Peter can understand he sold up everything and moved to New Zealand.

"The farm they moved to in New Zealand was nothing but a patch of bush, that's what they call the jungle there. My great-grandma lived in a tent with a baby for two years while her husband cleared enough land to start farming."

"What's cleared?"

"Cutting it clear of plants, you know like with a machete." It must have been hard hard work I thought to myself. The New Zealand bush is thick, dense with vines and ferns. 

"Anyway she lived in a leaking tent in the middle of the mud while he tried to get the farm going. In the end he never made any real money in New Zealand, he finally gave up farming and gave the land to his son. Uncle Peter told me that all his life he was poor and everything he turned his hand to went wrong. The best his life ever was was in England, he had money and his own home and a lovely farm and he just gave it all away."

Her anger started to bubble "Yeah and we had it good when we had our house on Colfax, and now...."

"I'm not saying that I did the right thing Julie. I don't know if I did or not, only time will answer that question. But what is done is done and I do understand at least a little better than Uncle Peter why he dragged his family half way round the world only to lose everything and fail. Sometimes the answer is not whether you won or lost at the game but rather whether you played the game or just sat in the sidelines."

The sun was completely gone now and the moon rose slowly up over the grey crashing waves.

"The point I'm trying to make my darling is that you come from a long line of adventurers. All of them got to New Zealand because they felt the need to try new things. They all abandoned their friends, their loved ones and set off to try to make a better life for themselves and their children. And that is all I am trying to do for you. History will tell us whether I did the right thing or not but for now see if you can just accept. I am who I am, I love you and want what is best for you. If none of your ancestors had been non-conformists who tried to make their own path then they would never have made it to Canada only to suffer through the winters in an attempt for a better life, or to New Zealand on the far reaches of the globe. Why did they do it, for the same reasons I believe that I do. Because they had to."

I put my arm around her. "One day you'll tell about this trip to your children."

"I'll tell them it sucked..."

"Of course you will my dear, but at least you'll have a story to tell."