The Road Home

Zap had reached that age, when a man has to do what he believes is right. He needed courage and endurance to follow the road ahead, that led to an uncertain future.

Lise and the kids were laughing as Zap crossed the third bridge and saw the familiar range of trees on the horizon. They turned into the driveway. The homestead and red barn stood as a well- maintained vestige of the past. Lise knew Zap needed time alone and went for a walk with the kids. Zap appreciated his space.

As he walked to the old red barn, he remembered his dad saying, “The only two things you can be sure of are death and taxes.” Zap went in through the back doors, past the vintage cars his dad had meticulously worked on and the neat workshop. He felt drawn like a magnet to the ladder. Climbing it, he arrived in his own special room in the barn. He looked about, watching the streaming beams of sunlight hit dust particles that seemed to hold their own cosmic rhythm. The smell of dry hay triggered memories of another time.

Zap looked over his life. As an anniversary gift, his eldest brother Joe, then 17, had agreed to watch his brother, Sam, for the weekend. Zap was the ‘little surprise’ from his parents’ second honeymoon, conceived as a by-product of a Valentine’s weekday special at the Prince of Wales Hotel in Niagara-on-the-Lake. His dad, Peter, and mom, Sara, named him Sean, meaning “God is gracious”, but his two brothers would drive his parents crazy by snapping their fingers and calling him “Zap”, to tease them about being frisky at their age. The name stuck. Zap’s brothers had both left for university before he was two and he had been raised as an only child. They affectionately called him the little prince. A kid doesn’t know anything different than what they experience.

His mom, Sara ,said she had lived up to her biblical namesake by giving birth at a very old age, remarking, “It must be in the genes.” Her own family had a spread of kids that varied by 25 years. It was one of those old-fashioned families, common before the advent of birth control. Grandma Rose had done what many mothers from that era had – she got pregnant almost every year since her marriage at age 17. She had 14 kids and 14 miscarriages from the time she was a teenage newlywed to when her body just had no more to give.

Sara and Peter had never complained about much. They knew what it was like to work, play and love hard, and how to accept and forgive mistakes that cause remorse. They had been committed to living a life of their dreams. The farm had been Sara’s stomping ground when she was growing up. Her family had emigrated here from Ireland a century ago, and their descendants had kept the original family home. Over time, Peter and Sara had bought the farm, their dream home in the rural countryside.

At age 11, Zap’s parents retired and moved from the big city to this rural community. With cheeks bright red from being sun-kissed, wind-burned or frost-nipped, Zap, the city boy, was the poster child for everything people thought of as country-style wholesome. His parents lived within their simple financial means, yet Zap had never felt he lacked for anything. Zap had learned the charms of the woods, river and countryside where cattle, turkeys and chickens were the alarm clocks. As a teenager, Zap had learned how to live on a farm. He developed a work ethic, where attention to detail could make completing a simple task become a job well-done.

When Zap was 13, his brother Sam died in a car accident. He did not know his brother very well. Zap had only known death of pets, this was new. He watched his mom and dad mourn and grieve. Ten years later, Joe died from cancer. Zap felt the loss more deeply and understood grief. He had assumed his filial role, with the daily phone calls and doing what he could to care for his parents. He was unprepared when they both died this past week.

At age 33, his life, as it had been, was no more. Zap felt he was broken, and living in a broken world. He joined the global millions who were still reeling from the shock and rapidity of changes caused by pandemic pandemonium. His generation was being called the fourth wave, and he felt he was drowning under a tsunami. His grief unravelled the firm foundations of how he thought life is supposed to be. He told himself that his parent had been fragile and elderly. He felt uncomfortable realizing it had been a blessing that they had both died the same week. Zap stood alone, as a responsible adult in a world that was nothing like he had imagined it to be.

Zap had brought his wife, their three-year-old daughter and 18 month-old son, to what he had called home for eight years of his life. He had visited his parents in the hospital, then had to bury them. He sent them off according to the traditions they had expressed as their wishes. Part of him said they were gone and would not notice what he did, however, he held onto the belief that, given their wishes could be respected, he would do his part to honour them. After the funeral, he and Lise both agreed that staying at the farm would be better than trying to get administrative tasks done from the city. Zap had to sort things then put the farm up for sale.

They easily settled into the family homestead, but Lise was worried about Zap. His parent’s deaths had stirred up mud at the bottom of his psyche. The confidence of his youth had disappeared. What was, had dissolved into a thing of the past. Society had fallen off the ladder and the wind had been knocked out of the sails. No one had been prepared for the devastation. Dealing with trauma had reached new heights. Zap felt he was cursed to a life of sadness.

Zap shook himself from this reverie. He went to the chest in the loft where he had stored some of his childhood belongings. He knew his three-year old, Siobhan, would enjoy playing with the Lego and transformers. As he was pulling them out, he found a piece of paper that drew his attention. On it was a picture and scribbling that one of his parents’ friends had given him. What was her name? The signature reminded him, Violet. His mom and dad explained that they were old friends from school. He had liked her. She laughed a lot and told him that she had gypsy blood and that fortune-telling ran in her family. He had saved this scrap because she had said. “This memory of today will hold something you will need in your future. It will help you remember where you have been, and see where you need to go.”

Zap sat, staring at the picture. The jute rug was on the wooden floor just as in the sketch, and the rope to swing over the hay below was still there. His dad had helped him rig up a pulley system to lift things up to his loft. He had books and an art centre, and there was an extension cord hooked up to a tape recorder with some of his dad’s classic rock tapes. Zap remembered that he had been offended that she drew him as a skinny ginger-haired, freckled kid in his room. It looked too real, not what he thought he should look like.

He then read her account:

“You have to climb the ladder. You can do it. I’ll help you when you get to the top,” Zap had said, encouraging her.

“Oh my,” Violet had commented, as she made her way up. “It looks so easy to climb a ladder when you are young but believe me it gets harder as you get older. What a nice place” she exclaimed. “This is better than a Harry Potter secret chamber,” giggled Violet. “That plastic owl perched on the rafter is perfect. This is a cool place for any aged kid. What a lot of love and pride have been packed into this little space. This may seem like a strange way to tell a fortune, but remember, this place has a lot of spirit and you know how to take care of it. Look at how the golden streams of light can find their way through the knot holes and barn board onto the loft. Remember that many before have followed the path of light through darkness and you can find a path from your heart to the place you call home.”

Her story stirred memories of those years of his Golden age, when he was so happy. Zap had worked hard to make this his very own place. He remembered how his mom and dad had often talked about the spirits around the farm. All his mother’s family was buried in the cemetery down the road and he had thought they believed in ghosts. Now, what they said started to make sense. He realized, his ancestors had lived and died, yet he had felt their spirits when he was a kid. Now his brothers' and parents’ spirits had joined them.

He remembered his mom explaining, “Dead wood in a forest is called a snag. In a tree dead wood creates heartwood, the dark, dense inner core that is used to support the tree and other communities.” Zap realized that those who had gone before him had formed the heartwood at his core. He knew that their spirit would give him the support and resilience he needed to carry on. With transformers in hand, Zap climbed down the ladder and realized that he no longer felt so alone.

That night, after he and Lise had put the kids to bed, they sat under the stars. Zap pointed out the North Star at the end of the driveway. He told Lise about Violet’s story and shared memories of this other time, and of his worries. “How had I been so self-assured thinking I knew all of the answers? I have acted like a foolish kid.” He spoke of his fear about the next disaster, that seemed to be part of life. “Here, at the farm, I know nature’s clock, where the sun and moon rise and set during the seasons, but I haven’t a clue about what changes to expect in this crazy world. What will the future holds for the kids? Lise listened. They sat quietly and looked at the sky. Both saw a shooting star and squeezed the other’s hand.

Lise said, “You know, we don’t need to go to the office every day to do our jobs. This is our time to make the best out of life.” Lise and Zap spoke into the early hours. They discussed that they could sell the farm, or just maybe, they could move here. Both recognized that the cost of living would be less and driving into the city two days a week would be a manageable and affordable inconvenience. The kids would do well. They made up their mind. They would stay at the farm.

Later, when Lise saw the sketch and scribblings that Violet had written for Zap when he was a kid, she pointed out the vague outline of their family on the walls of the red barn. Both agreed that maybe Violet was a fortune-teller. They knew their children would learn how to climb the ladder, and use pulleys and collect treasures to add to the chest held in the loft of the old red barn. They would be supported by the spirit of the heartwood found on the road home.