To The Ocean and The Mountain and Back Again

 

  Back when I  was in my late twenties, my husband Jack died from a heart attack the day after Christmas. He had been diabetic since he was thirteen, back in the nineteen fifties, and never got good control of his blood sugars. Though he had developed high blood pressure six months before, I was totally shocked by his death.  I had never lived on my own before and grief turned into heavy drinking and darkness. Eventually I  was living in a very small world, basically going to work and the bar and home again, day after day.
     When I began to have panic attacks at work or most anywhere other than home, I started seeking help to get back to a more normal life. In time, I was able to stop drinking with support of  others who have been there, as well as professional folks. It took some time before I was able to expand my world and after a while I began to feel a yearning to watch the sunrise over the ocean. My first time going to the Jersey shore after I began to clear up was with a guy I had met about that time. He had to go down to talk to someone about a painting job and we combined that with an overnight stay. I was up early the next morning and walked out to the beach to wait for the sun to come up. Similar to my coming out of my darkness, the sunlight gradually grew and colors brightened into pinks and yellows until it was daylight. 
     I'm not sure how long it was after that, but either later that year or sometime in the next, I drove to Ocean City, New Jersey  alone to see the sunrise over the ocean again. Though less than a hundred miles away, it was the farthest I had gone on my own in quite some time and I was hopeful I would not have a panic attack and need to turn around and go home. I made it, and have been to the shore many times since. I have probably taken hundreds of pictures of the sun coming up out of the ocean but I framed the first one and it still hangs in my living room to remind me of that experience of coming out of the darkness, overcoming fears, and going after my dreams.
     In time, God brought another man into my life who would become my second husband. Joe and I and his son Sean took many vacations to the shore and I found myself wanting that seaside lifestyle more and more. We were able initially to purchase a small rental property and then an old vacation apartment turned condo in Wildwood. The fear I had felt those many years ago was forgotten as, together or alone, I made the drive down and back on a regular basis. It became such a routine part of my life that I stopped recording sunrise over the ocean, though I always think of it when I hear the lines from an old Easter hymn about "the sun from out the waves".
     Joe  battled with cancer for a year and a half and died of a stroke after we had been together for thirteen years and Wildwood became my home away from home that summer as I took a three month leave of absence to heal. There were many walks on the beach at sunrise as well as during the day. And many meetings with folks in that town, as well as my hometown,  who helped me get through the darkness without having to return to drinking.
     The following year, I attended a Body, Mind and Spirit Expo and had a session with a woman medium who gave me a message that was clearly from Joe. A short time later I saw an ad for a South West Spirit Quest tour with this same woman and I signed up. I flew from Philly to Albuquerque and met up with Lino and a dozen other folks for a full ten days of travel through New Mexico and Arizona to many Native American sites and healers, as well as red rocks and vortices in Sedona. The last day of the tour, I declined the trip out to Taos Pueblo and opted to spend the day walking around Santa Fe instead.

     Over the next six years or so, I would get the thought to go back and visit Taos. It kept calling me, sort of like the feeling of wanting to see the sunrise over the ocean had all those years ago. I booked a casita near the Plaza and flew out to New Mexico again, this time on my own. I had been to the Southwest with the group and visited my son in San Diego the year before, but this was the first time traveling father than the shore on my own. I had dinner with a friend of a friend when I arrived in Albuquerque then drove north the next day to Taos. The feeling of freedom was incredible. I had come so far since that first solo trip to Ocean City and there I was traveling up wide highways and narrow winding mountain roads with only God keeping me company. It felt like such a miracle.
     I had researched Taos and chosen where I wanted to go, but the first sighting of Taos Mountain as I drove north from Rancho de Taos was beyond exhilarating.

I spent four days in Taos, visited Taos Pueblo, one of the oldest continually inhabited sites in North America, crossed the Rio Grande Gorge bridge, the second highest bridge in the US Highway system, and walked around the Plaza shopping and listening to music. Since it is an artist colony, the town is filled with galleries and I did visit a few of those. I stopped in a book store and chatted with the shop's cat, and ate at the local diner. It was just a small taste of the area, but another big adventure for me.

     On the return trip back to Albuquerque I drove the Turquoise Trail, a beautiful country mountain byway,  stopped in another artists village, Madrid, traveled about twenty miles of old Route 66 and had dinner at Diner 66 on my last evening in the Land of Enchantment. Maybe one day I'll take a longer trip on The Mother Road.

  A couple months ago I was feeling tired and stretched thin. I booked myself a room in Wildwood and took a weekend to just get away and watch the sun rise over the ocean again. It did not disappoint.