Last Firsts

FosterAbba here. Yondalla asked me to post the following:

This message comes to you by the gracious assistance of FosterAbba. I can access email on my phone, theoretically. What that means however is leaving the comfort of the house and perching on a rock on the beach where the sun is too bright and the signal weak. Text messages are more complicated for FosterAbba, but they can be written and saved off-line and resent as necessary. Emails lost to bad connections are simply gone. So everyone buzz over to FosterAbba's and say thank you. Now...on to my report.

It is beyond lovely here. It is, as always, breath-taking. Today in particular is spectacular. The sun is bright, the water blue as far as one can see. I sit and look at the surf, the islands, and the sail boats that go by. Lobster boats too, of course.

It is difficult to be here. It is the last time. I tell myself that it is just a place, but I don't believe it. This corner of the world is the spot where my husband came every summer, where my children have come every year but one. The boys have imagined coming here with their own children. A piece of my soul is in the rocks on that beach. I don't disagree with the reasons for doing it, but that doesn't make it easier.

What does make it easier is Gary. Everything is new for him. Everything that is for me a last time is for him a first: a visit to our favorite ice cream place; going to the dock to buy lobsters ("sheddars, pound an a haf each"); the cookies I for some reason only bake here. I think without him we would just sit sadly on the beach and hide in our respective bedrooms. That however is not fair to him. He must be taken to the cove at low tide to catch, and release, tiny crabs. He must go to all the favorite spots. When I might otherwise feel I just cannot face one more "last time" I see him grinning with pleasure and amazement, and I smile.

Well most of the time. When we first were driving here he exclaimed, "This must be the most beautiful place on earth!" I lost it. So did Brian. We spent some time in a bedroom crying.

But I am better now.