Twin Pears

I'm not sure how to put into words the feelings that came rushing over me as we topped the hill and the outline of that magnificent tree was beginning to come into focus. As it drew closer, my first thoughts were of just how amazing it was that while the pear tree stood strong and sturdy there was no evidence that anything else had ever been there.

It was quite overwhelming. How could somewhere that had been so important to my life disappear? All that was left of the greatest of my childhood memories was just that one tree. The small yellow, two bedroom house that used to be shaded by the tree in the evenings was gone. The clothes line that seemed to always have laundry fluttering in the wind that moved lightly through this valley (well most of the time anyway) was nowhere to be seen. The wood pile that graced the side of the little porch, keeping us warm in the winter and giving me plenty of work the rest of the year; Gone. The little white picket fence that used to be the boundary between home and freedom; gone. The mailbox, the chicken coops, the garden all vanished. Even the road that once ran out in front had long-since been reclaimed by the Earth. All but the tree.

However, my memories were so crisp and clear that in those first few moments I could see it all. Just as fresh and new as it had been the first time I had ever seen it all so many years ago….

I will never forget how it was that I came to live in now deserted field. Twenty-five years had passed since I first arrived at the house of my Aunt Sylvia. She was my mother's sister and had agreed to let me stay when my mom could no longer care for me. My mother was bi-polar long before there was a clear diagnosis for it and suffered severe bouts of both manic and mania. I was ten when the state committed her to an asylum leaving me a ward of the state.

It was at a hearing in which the state was deciding what to do with me that I first saw my aunt. She looked a lot like my mother. Same brown hair. Same soft smile. I remember thinking for a second that she had pulled herself together as she had so many times before and I was going to get to be with her once again. But just before I hollered out to her two uniformed officers came through the door, between was my mom. She looked so awful. Tired, scared, and dirty she looked passed me as if she had no idea who I was. I had to do a double take as I thought my mind must be going too. I looked at the worn out shell of the woman whom had raised me and then back to the woman who sat in the gallery calm and composed.

My thoughts were racing trying to figure out how it could be. It seemed as if she finally had actually split in two. All of my life I watched as the two very different people that had occupied the same body fought for control. Some days she was the calm, sweet, picture of perfection just the same as the woman sitting in the gallery appeared to be and other she was the tired mess who sat shackled to the defendants chair. I wondered how the two women I knew to be locked in an eternal struggle for control had finally became separate beings. It was about that same time the judge's voice broke through as I heard him call a "Sylvia Trotter" and refer to her as "the sister of the defendant". As the spitting image of my mother at her best rose to her feet to address the court, I was thinking I had no idea my mother even had a sister. She had never once mentioned her.

The rest of the rest of the trial was a blur of legal speak where at the end of which custody was awarded to Ms. Sylvia Trotter biological aunt to the juvenile in question. The judge banged his gavel, the officers let my mother hug me one last time and took her away. I didn't know then that it would be the last time I ever saw her. She did not fair well at the asylum. I don't know but I like to believe that she knew I was finally safe and gave up her life long struggle with control just a little over a week later. Her death was ruled a stroke.

As for me, I picked up the one suitcase and worn teddy bear that made up all of my worldly belongings that day and walked dumbfounded to the car in which my aunt Sylvia sat waiting. It was a long fairly quiet ride to what was now to be my home. The only words spoken were from my aunt explaining to me that she and my mother were twins and how she hadn't seen her in years. She, just like myself earlier, had no idea I existed until she was approached by an officer of the state only two days ago. As we drew closer the first thing I noticed as we drew down a small dirt road was a sturdy tree covered in beautiful blooms. She had seen me staring and told me it was a pear tree. And how she loved it so much she built her life around it.

We pulled into the drive and I followed her through the house where she showed me to my room and left me to get my things settled. When I came back out I could not find her in the house anywhere and for a very frightening moment I thought she must have disappeared. I thought maybe my first thought of my mother's two halves separating was real and being able to exisit she had been sucked back inside the tortured woman that the officers had drug back to the asylum. And if that was so, then where was I...I felt my heart leap into my throat and panic washed over me entirely and just as I was about lose my mind for sure I seen her through the window. On a blanket under the tree she had laid out a picnic and was patiently waiting for me to join her.

When I did, she smiled and began to tell me stories of she and my mother's childhood days. The more she talked the more I relaxed. Between the loving reconts of her sister, the softness in her eyes and the sweetness in the air from the tree in bloom I knew I was home and everything was going to be okay. So many milestones in life had happened under that tree in the years to follow. My first scraped knee, my first rope swing, my first love, my first kiss, even the day I said "I do" all took place right there. And now, on the day of the greatest woman of my life's funeral I returned once again. This time to say goodbye. To both her and the tree. My mother and her struggle and to give thanks for all that each of them had given me.