The Beauty of the Unknown

Looking back at the summers I experienced throughout my younger years, I can’t remember much. Maybe an occasional beach day here and there or possibly a baseball game. Perhaps even a party my parents would throw, inviting over the families of my brother’s entire team. Those simple memories faded over the years. The memory this picture holds, however, and the events it symbolizes never will.

Every summer for about a week or two, I took a trip to my grandparent's house in Vermont. 50 Martell Road Alburgh, Vermont 05440 was the address. I remember it by heart from writing letter after letter to my grandparents, going back and forth with each other for years.

In the photo itself, I’m going through a tacklebox, sorting through fishing bait, lines, and hooks. This was something I often did by myself, enjoying the silent company of the fake fish and worms I found in the box. Normally I was alone, or I would beg my father to step away from whatever sports game was on the tv to come and sit downstairs with me to sort. This moment in time I remember, choosing which tackle I wanted to bring to fish with my grandfather up in Vermont even though I knew he would disregard them in favor of his tackle, claiming mine weren’t good enough.

Vermont as a whole was jaw droppingly beautiful in the summer, especially in August and September when the green leaves started changing from a healthy color to the amber and crimson foliage signalling the start of fall. The vast mountain ranges that lacked their usual snowy caps accentuated how heavenly the land truly was underneath the cold that usually dominated the northern state. It gave off such a comfortable feel when you drove by a herd of cows that ran alongside your car until their fence stopped them. When the only time you usually saw cows was at fairgrounds with packed crowds staring at the large animals while they slept, finding them in their natural habitat was so much better. Coming from a flat town by the ocean, Vermont seemed like another world.

My grandparents’ house was one of my favorite places in the world though, ranging from my grandfather’s fish shop that reeked like dead fish to the hundreds of toads and frogs in the large gardens scattered around the property. Even the ceramic white ducks placed in the garden were positioned as if they were dancing together, enjoying the property just as much as I did. The section of town they lived in was all farm lands so their small little one story house was isolated from the busier section of Alburgh. Eventually, my grandparents separated and divorced. I wondered what was to become of my Vermont haven: the summers of fishing, the frogs and the house, the cows and the fields... and my family.

My grandparents were completely different people. Sometimes I wonder how they even lived together to begin with. Each time I visited, I would spend time fishing and descaling the bodies afterwards with my grandfather and then go to some Bible school church camp with my grandmother, regardless of the fact she knew I didn’t practice the religion. I didn’t understand then, but looking back at it now, I can comprehend that she wanted to share what she loved with her eldest granddaughter. How do things like that change?

My grandmother left the house, and by doing this, she left me. She moved across the country to Washington to live with one of her other granddaughters she hadn’t even met yet. It makes me wonder if all of those weeks I spent staying with them meant nothing, that no matter how good the tackle and supplies were that I brought, it was never good enough. I never quite forgave her and she acted like missing out on every holiday we used to spend together was nothing. I can still remember what it sounded like when she used to call to sing me happy birthday every year. I can even remember how I felt the first year she stopped calling. Now, the four hour time difference seems to act as a barrier to any communication between us whatsoever.

As for my grandfather, him forgetting my birthday wasn’t surprising to me at all. My memory of him was distorted by my mom’s experience with him when she was younger. She forced the feelings she held for her father onto her own daughter, ruining our relationship indefinitely. At one time I admired him for teaching me how to pick a good cucumber or pick green beans, and it seemed the next moment, I couldn't even tolerate him in my house. It’s funny how adults can change the way children think by simply sharing their own experiences. I was never able to look at him the same. After they moved from the house, he and I never got to fish together again.

What I don’t remember about this photo is the fact that it was even taken. As a child, I don’t remember phones and social media and all the other devices I memorized being in the world I live in today. The child in the photo relied on woods, frogs, and other outdoor objects to entertain herself, not even caring enough to convert to memory the image of my mother’s phone. The girl in the photo also didn’t know the truthfulness of what growing up was like, electronics in the future being thrust into her face every way she looked. If she had known that in 11 years she would be writing this vignette on the computer she was obligated to buy in order to pass her junior year, she may have just run back to the comfort of Vermont.

There was so much she didn’t know about growing up being who she was. In that photo, she was still completely oblivious to what life had in store for her. The only world she ever knew was baseball, friends, and the outdoors. She hadn’t been introduced to insecurity, still doing and saying whatever she cared to no matter what people thought, hanging out with whoever made her happy. She hadn’t been taught what it felt like for her friend’s mom to comment on how gross she looked when she didn’t brush her hair going to school. It wasn’t her fault, she never learned how. She didn’t understand what it was like to worry about what she wore and how she looked, still dressing in her brother’s hand-me-downs and baseball cap. The fears that would come with becoming a woman in a male-dominated society were never taught to her in second grade either. All of that information would be introduced to her later in life, despite her avoidance of the topics.

That girl in the photo wasn’t the only thing that aged. That house she was preparing to visit, the house she had been waiting to go to for the entire summer, had not aged well. Now, that house is a death farm, a slaughterhouse for cows to be precise. The new owners ripped up the flower gardens, tore up the vegetables, and destroyed the gazebo that sat in the center of the yard. Sometimes, this makes me relate growing up to the transition the house went through. It started as such a wholesome and beautiful estate and turned into something dark and sinister, showing the realities of what knowledge and experience can do to a person.

Learning what the world held for a pure and oblivious seven year old was probably one of the worst things I’ve ever experienced. There is not a single thing in this world that I wouldn’t give in order to be back to where I was in that photo, when the most exciting thing in my life was going fishing with my grandparents or tagging along to my brother’s baseball games. I wonder what it would be like to become the girl in that photo again. Maybe I would be happier, maybe not. Sometimes I think that the house on 50 Martell Road still holds those memories that were forgotten to the natures of time, one of the only places I find my connection with my grandparents still remaining, even if it’s missing from my life.