A Forever Day at the Beach

When I was five, my mother and I went
to the beach on Flye Point one morning,
the rocky beach, the one I loved the most.
I was jumping around on the rocks, which
were like cliffs to me then, and at some point
my mother stopped me. She said, "Sweetheart,
I want you to stop for a moment." Her tone had
taken on an odd character I had never heard
before. I stopped instantly. "I want you to look
around you," she continued, "Look around you
and remember this day, always remember it.
Remember that we were here together on this beach
one morning in Maine when you were a boy.
Remember that we loved each other. Promise me
that you'll always remember." I looked around me.
"I promise," I said as I looked back at her,
standing there smiling but choking back tears.
It's only now, thirty years later, I am able
to look back and really see her though, the young
woman at least as confused as I've been for decades,
standing there on the rocks, looking at her young
son, hoping he would never know the terrible
sadness life can bring us all. It is only now I can
resolve to tell my mother next time we speak, "I do
remember that morning, vividly, just as you said
I would. And I finally have a sense of who you
were then, the young woman who, maybe, felt
as though her world was folding in on itself, not
knowing which way to turn, who was left to turn to,
whose shoulder there would ever be again to cry on.
I know what it's like to wake up and face the cold
world alone, to walk out into the day with dreams
in smithereens. And I love you more deeply
with each tough lesson I swallow." It is only now
I can resolve to tell all the mothers I know, "Stop
your children. Ask them to remember forever that
they love you. Ask them to remember the minutes
when they were young and they will. They will
always remember the hope they had once. They will
always remember how much you loved each other.
But you've got to ask them. Please, do us all a favor:
ask your kids to remember any old day at the beach
when they were young and loved their mothers more
than anything. And they will. They will. Just ask them."

(2006)