The most important work we can do, individually and globally, is the healing and prevention of traumas so that we don't pass them down to future generations. This blog is a working tool to contribute to this good work.
Yes, I am working my way to the bottom of my mother’s papers and just found something that strikes me as being SO STRANGE!
In with my mother’s mother’s college graduation information from Boston University 1917 and masters graduation transcript and information for the University of Minnesota in 1918 I found two very old regular size envelopes with ‘Bureau of Educational and Vocational Guidance, 6 Park Street, Boston, Mass. printed on them. Neither envelope was ever mailed or addressed – but here is what is written in my mother’s child handwriting – evidently before she even knew how to spell her own name (I am going to correct the spelling here in this text):
On the first one:
and presently upon her breast a baby raised and cried aloud. Her mother was so surprised she wept upon her golden hair which was upon her breast. She wept and wept until a bride arrived and swept
On the second one:
a ruined city in my heart. Of the deep wilderness of the wood where you and I shall walk free as when I rode that day where the bare foot maiden raked the hay.
Mildrid
[actual spelling of her name is Mildred] – ah, my youngest sister solved the puzzle – partly:
“As you point out, very precocious of her to understand the meaning of the poetry.”
The strangeness of these two pieces – archetypal image of the mother and baby – but why with the sorrow and the weeping? – prophetic?THIS is what I believe took my mother to Alaska. THIS is what called her to homestead.Archetypal – prophetic of the HUNGER FOR THE LAND, of the ruined city in the heart – reminds me of her dark rainbow storm dream – healed upon the land?
I would think because of the misspelled words that my mother did not copy these words from some other text, which does not mean that she didn’t know the words from some other place. Of course the context for these writings will never be known, but they definitely have been saved for a very long time – probably since around 1935 (when my mother was 10 or even from an earlier time).
This looks about like an age eight handwriting – even then the seeds of how my mother’s life turned out had certainly already been planted within her beginning with not having her needs met from infancy forward. The loss of her grandfather, of her father, and the loss of her mother when her mother went to work to support her family once she had divorced when my mother was five.
Whatever all the combined influences were in her very early years, I can’t help but wonder about these images contained upon these envelopes that have probably traveled 25,000 miles and are 75 years old today, June 16, 2010 when I found them: The a troubled mother with her infant daughter and the yearning for the healing of the land.
How would it happen that a child this young would understand the meaning of these phrases, “a ruined city in my heart” and “the deep wilderness of the wood where you and I shall walk free?” I wonder. I have to deeply wonder.
(And if these are archetypal images with their archetypal figures, whom might the ‘bride’ and ‘the barefoot maiden’ be?)
++++
This reminds me of something I wrote August 21, 2007 on a little piece of paper that I dropped into the ‘mess’ of my mother’s papers and also found today:
Did Mother have to pay the price for “going on being” by leaving the biggest part of who she was and who she could have been and was meant to be — behind?
(Informed compassion) – Understanding frees me to love my Mother — and then to love myself better — as an extension of her (and Dad). If we “hate” a parent we cannot help but have that hatred carry over to how we feel about our self.
As I transcribed this one of my mother’s 1957 early Alaskan letters seven weeks into her new life, I find myself ‘wishing’ that a miracle could have been possible so that some kind of surgery could have been performed that would have removed every single remnant of my mother’s mental illness from her. As I work with these last of the hundreds and hundreds of pages of her writing that I have transcribed, I continue to wonder, “Who actually WAS my mother?”
It’s as if her mental illness possessed her, took over her mind and body, so that who my mother ACTUALLY was had to fight and struggle to exist side-by-side within that SAME so-troubled body and mind. When am I glimpsing my ‘real’ mother and when the ‘sick’ one? In the end, it’s not mine to figure this out, as much as a part of me wants to.
Instead, some part of me remembers from my childhood that it was the other way around and that the ‘problem’ was me, meaning that the set-up was if LINDA could be amputated and removed from my mother’s and therefore from your family’s life, everything would have been fine!
It’s very hard for me not to feel as I read her writings (which of course do not talk about her mental illness or the terrible abuse of me she was so capable of committing) that somehow all the trouble with Linda REALLY WAS BECAUSE THERE WAS SOMETHING BAD AND WRONG WITH ME. Part of me tells me, “Linda, it all WAS your fault! Read these words. See what a marvelous person your mother REALLY was. The problem WAS all you. Linda, YOU BROKE YOUR MOTHER!”
In this letter I realize that my mother is describing something I would name LAND HUNGER. This kind of hunger is carried by some people, but not by the majority. This LAND HUNGER DID belong to America’s early pioneers, I have no doubt of this fact. But I don’t sense this as a ‘land fever’ in my mother’s letter here. It seems to be literally a longing, a great hunger.
My mother makes a most interesting and insightful comment in this piece of writing:
“I must have been a pioneer in my old life.”
I believe a part of my mother that was her TRUE self (not the sick self) is present in this writing:
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
October 21, 1957 Monday evening
Dear Mother,
Right this minute I should be washing dinner dishes – my kitchen is a mess! I usually attempt to wash them now immediately after dinner but tonight we ate late and I read to the children instead. So-o- will make this short – really too!
Bill brought home Linda’s [late] Birthday package and note and my nice letter! I just had to write you tonight – without delay – to let you know how beautiful I think the skirt is and what’s more, and this I know, we’ll relieve you – it’s a perfect fit and length!!!!! I consider the whole thing a marvelous accomplished [sic] and you certainly are a seamstress plus everything else! Congratulations. I’d probably never fully appreciate the beauty of the workmanship if I didn’t sew myself – but it’s really perfectly done. Well, I could rave on and on.
Linda does like it and I told her you did it for her because you loved her and she must show her love for you and appreciation by taking very good care of it. I adore the colors – they’re beautiful. Wouldn’t a royal or powder blue sweater be pretty too? The white is very cute and fits well too – it’s also extremely versatile. You know – even the buttons were in just the right spot. I sure love it.
Cindy size 5 – and she looked adoringly at it and said I’d like one too!! HINT
Knock on wood – we’re all very fine now. The weather is very warm and that one light snow flurry weeks ago has been it! This warm weather is most unusual for this time of year!!! Today it showered some but the week-end was perfect. I’ll tell you more next time I write but a short of what we did over the week-end.
Friday I did make pie, clean and The Glenn Briggs, from across the creek came over. We had worried some over way to entertain them as they’re more your age – oh about 50 I guess – (you’re so energetic, you seem 50 – REALLY!) We had a nice time – just talking. He’s very nice and we both like him very much. He’s unlike Scotty who we don’t care to see much of. He’s natural, intelligent, bulging with ideas, enthusiastic and just plain nice!! Could be Bill’s father – looks like Bill and acts like him – our doorish and all. (More energetic, but that comes from living in Alaska!)
His wife is nice – more quiet and reserved and harder to get to know. Seems to resent the influx of people here in Eagle River, even though they’re partly responsible. They were the ones who had originally lived on Vanover’s farm, having bought the 160 acre homestead. (Farmed and had hog ranch for seven years and then leased 40 acres to Vanovers – who bought it after three years. They exercised an option to buy and meanwhile prices here had gone up – so Briggs regretted not waiting. They subdivided rest here and built this house, Janie’s and their own – sold Pottel’s that house and land. He bought another 160 acre adjoining homestead and has sold lots off and really made $ — lives off of profits!!! Some dealer (operator). He’s still holding about 90 acres across road, next to stream, beyond Vanovers.
Oh, Mom, we’ve been miserable this weekend and sick for land. It’s all gone in this area – we’re too late. If only we had come here eight years ago, I’ve been sick all week-end over it.
I found out Johnsons – parents of our babysitter – Homesteaded 160 acres five years ago. The most beautiful land you ever saw! Yes, five years ago we could have and we’re too late.
It’s $800 an acre now and will go up, up, up! Many are getting rich – you multiply it! Isn’t it sickening! Then most are holding it for further, higher prices. This section is booming. They’re adding three new stores now to our shopping center – and exclusive restaurant!!
Oh Mom, I so love it here – Eagle River Road is home to me!
Saturday we looked into five acres of land Briggs told us about plus a homesteaded ‘habitable house’ (??) on it. You see they could PROVEUP on the land, get title, and leave it. This 160 acres belongs to the owner of the Woodcraft Shop [Bockstahler] over across from our mailboxes – the one with such beautiful lamps etc. He originally had his shop in this house – expanded and took a business tract and now really has something.
Well, Briggs quoted 2500 for the five acres plus house. Now it’s 4,000 and no road to it. Well there are two roads but can’t use them – so there would be that cost. To think this man owned this and left it. He too, is not anxious to sell as prices going up, up, up. His 160 acres is about three miles beyond us. He has level land and slight slopes, all overlooking mountains, glacier and Eagle River. It’s indescribably beautiful – I’d give all I own to own it!
He will sell these five acres for 4,000 – 1,000 down and it’s a bargain as prices stand now because it does have a partly finished house (he lived there two years) of three rooms and a well! [Bockstahler’s ‘shack’ or ‘cabin’ we rented later in the summer]
What a view! Oh Mother, we took a picnic there and it was grand! Of course there’s no stream (a small brook!) but the mountains look like Heidi’s Alps and all at once I’m reminded of ‘Trail of Lonesome Pine’ scenery – remember? It’s just as beautiful and one lonesome pine stood outside the front windows.
I believe my parents DID buy this five acres the following summer - and then let it go when they moved into Anchorage for the winter of 1958 and then to homestead spring of 1959There is 'the lone pine' Mildred writes about in this October 1957 letter
If we had 1,000 (ha, ha) I would buy it — We could still homestead out someday (maybe). It’s even gone in Valley now! Or tract, etc. but you see, these all require you to live on them right away. Here’s a house – of sorts – no bathroom etc. – but Bill could fix it up in a few months and we could move in when our lease here expires and save that rent.
Five acres would cost 30,000 there in Pasadena – and you’d never find it. Lumber is so high here that house is worth something! There’s room for horses, a garden etc. and it’s still in this section – same stores, school, etc.
The house there now is on the perfect location – it sits on a knoll overlooking the valley below and surrounding mountains. I would like to move it elsewhere on the five acres, fix it up some – live in it build another (one room and move in) then rent the old house for $100.
Oh darn it, $ $ $ — we have a few pennies and Bills, bills, bills.
I wish you were here to talk to – and to see this scenery. It’s spectacular, wonderful, marvelous and the skies so blue, blue – the air like wine. You’d adore it and all the cultural advantages of Pasadena – best schools, stores, shops!!
I could kick [many underlines] us around Alaska for not having come before! I tell you I was sick all week-end and I want to do something next summer! Our lease here is up August first. Come before then because I’m warning you – I’ll live in a tent or quonset hut to get land like that!
[Linda note: And she did! Actually a combination of both: A Jamesway is a canvas Quonset, like a big curved tent. This is ‘LAND HUNGER’, and she had it bad.]
The further up the Eagle River Road you go the less flat land there is. The Johnson Place is perfect – as they have flat land and a view of the mountains and even the glacier! Beyond it gets very mountainous – no level land – even the road is carved out of the mountain and to the right is a drop to the river and swampy land – so even as the road is built as the government plans to extend it, there won’t be livable land there!
The part that hurts me the most is that there are no hicks Mom, here. The people are refined, educated and plain NICE – they come from California mostly (Funny). They’re just like us and they homesteaded. They did without electricity, roads etc. – even five years ago Mrs. Briggs didn’t have electricity here! In fact, while building this place – it’s seven years old – they saw a bear in the yard! And one time a baby bear was looking through our dining room window! So there!!
Well, my dishes are still undone. Once I get started.
So even though we would have to buy that land at $800 an acre we would be ahead. There could be a phone, plumbing, electricity etc. It would be half mile from Eagle River Road and one mile from nearest neighbor and four miles from shopping center – but it’s perfect for me. Why, dream though. It’s quite impossible. But see, say our payments would be 40 per month – we could live in it in August, September, October and apply this 150 a month to fix it up. 1,000 down, 1,000 payments = 2,000 Balance by next August – and only 40 a month payments and no rent! Just 100 from here for three months or so would make it livable. Maybe we could dicker to use neighbor’s road (there are two roads already!)
Tell me your reaction. I bet it sounds primitive to you but to me it’s right. I must have been a pioneer in my old life. I love I there – and it’s not rugged to me – only picturesque and beautiful. [Linda note: bold type is mine.]
The children adore it here too and are completely happy. They’re real Alaskans!
Sunday they went to church and we spent afternoon home. I made hot rolls – best yet. It’s a basic sweet dough recipe. I made half into Swedish Tea Ring (m-m!) and other half into Egg braid. They both looked professional. The Braid raised so high it filled my cooking sheet! I’ll bake you bread and rolls next summer!
What a note – I can’t resist!
I think Carolyn is [bunch of squiggles]. So there! Not to write and so does Bill!! Shall I write Charlie?
Hope you’re really taking care and getting more rest and please eat right. Maybe we’ll reserve ‘old house’ for you for summer, say!! — an idea! I have too many for my own good.
Good night Mom. I miss you terribly!! Everything here I want to share with you – how will I ever wait. Come for Xmas instead, could you? And again in July. How I wish you could!! Will be good now and do dishes. Bill has gone up to ask Jo Anne about that movie thing I got him into – and I promised to clean kitchen up before he came home!
[Mildred sketched the five acres with notes]
House is not included in price so is really a gift. Owners had to build it under Homesteading Requirements. There’s flat land for garden or corral, a driveway of sorts. Woods comprise the five acres, could be farmed or left as is. No work on this land here, it’s forest! Bill could use birch for outside of house and it would look like a Swiss Chalet in Switzerland.
P.S. Finally I got a nice letter from Grace! And a joint note from group of girls in Glendora. Grace recently had a car accident – she’s OK. She tells me to write (what do you know), found my letters so interesting. Said I should contract Star News about column ‘Lloyd’s in Alaska’. Wouldn’t hurt to inquire, will you?
I wrote various letters on Friday and sent various pictures to the whole gang. Please explain to Charlie I wouldn’t send anything to Carolyn. Anyways she’s selfish not to write in six weeks – plain mean!! Anyways explain to Charlie – O.K.! He’s so busy I didn’t want to obligate him to show them around and Elsie and Byron will enjoy it!
* I hope you keep my letters. I spend so much time writing to you I neglect making notes for books and might need my letters to you for reference! [Linda note: June 16, 2010 as I transcribe these letters – again, she did not DATE any of them even with this intention to use them as historical record! What a job I have to work from postmarks when the letters are with envelopes or piece the story together!]
Again, a big thank you to my oldest daughter for the collection of climbing rose bushes she gave to me last Mother’s Day! Today, June 16, 2010 two of the plants showed their first blossoms! Once the summer rains come all plants enter an impressive growth stage, and it will be fantastic to watch these plants REALLY take off!
This is the 'Dream Weaver'This is the 'High Society' - both of these plants are going to bloom with clusters of roses
I just finishing transcribing another version Mother wrote about the decision they made to move to leave Los Angeles and move to Alaska. I like this one better. There is no indication of when it was written, but I think it was written before the one I posted last night.
It leaves me thinking that no matter how genuine and authentic their ‘dream’ was, my mother’s undiagnosed and untreated severe mental illness did actually destroy any chance our family had to ACTUALLY ‘live happily ever after’, which is something I believe my parents both hoped for when they made this HUGE move. That tragedy is real, even if I cannot find even a glimmer of it in this piece she wrote:
Sometimes I wish I could talk to some ‘mental health professional’ just about the moving around that my mother did. As she mentions in her piece of writing that I transcribed yesterday and posted the link to in *October 1958 – DREAMS CAN COME TRUE, my mother believed that my father provided a kind of stabilizing counterweight to her impetuousness. But I wonder what would have happened to her in her life if my parents had not yoked themselves to one another?
I still have not completely delineated and visibly lined up the number of moves that my mother arranged and that mostly my father accomplished during their married years prior to my leaving their home when I was 18. Some part of me this morning wants to stop and take account of the moves that had already happened before my mother had written her October 1958 description of their Alaskan ‘venture’, as she called it.
My parents married June 11, 1949 and as far as I know they lived on/at Almont in Los Angeles at least until their first child was born on June 15, 1950. Then comes a move. I don’t believe I was born while they were living there, so probably by August 31, 1951 they were living in a rented house on Calavaras (wherever in LA that was).
So, from Almont to Calavaras to a rented apartment by July 10, 1953 when my sister was born, then probably to a house my parents bought in Altadena that they did not sell until they were moving to Alaska even though my spring of 1956 they were in another new house they purchased in Glendora (still in LA area).
We must not have lived in this location of the 4th move for much more than a year, but that would have been four moves in the first seven years of their marriage. The move to Alaska, which involved my father leaving first and being gone from us for two months in June and July of 1957. According to mother’s writing, they sold the Glendora house (and the Altadena one) before my father went to Alaska and moved into a ‘court apartment’.
From this apartment, after my father had left, my mother then moved us into a motel, out of the motel into a rented house, out of the house into her mother’s, up to the mountains for a week, back to her mothers, and then probably into another motel before she left for Anchorage.
So, adding up these longer and shorter term moves and locations, let’s see – that’s around 11 moves that were made with children in tow before mother reached Alaska and the infamous Log House in Eagle River on August 1, 1957. The log house was probably move number 12.
We stayed ‘all cozy’ in the log house until June 1958, by which time my father had already located the 160 acres spot of our homestead and had staked claim, or filed on the land. We moved out of the log house into Bockstahler’s ‘shack’ or ‘cabin’ (its title depended on mothers move moment to moment) where we stayed until October 1958.
At that point the six of us moved into an apartment on Government Hill in Anchorage area where we stayed until about the following March, and by April 1, 1959 we were off on our homesteading adventure.
So by the time my mother wrote her *October 1958 – DREAMS CAN COME TRUE piece she (I’m quite certain it wasn’t my father) had orchestrated, staged and managed to accomplish 14 moves. I was 7 when this piece was written, and already by then I had been dragged around through probably 13 moves with my parents, and that was only the beginning.
So, talking about ‘life’ and ‘childhood’ in attachment-related terms, right along with the incredible vacillation and instability of my mother’s moment-to-moment mental-mood states and the insecurity they caused in the lives of all around her came the physical moving from place to place that even further guaranteed a complete environment of lack of safety and security for my parents children.
My mother wrote *October 1958 – DREAMS CAN COME TRUE from within the small enclosure of a massive, ugly apartment complex. True, the move ‘to town’ was no doubt simply seen as ‘as step in the right direction’ toward accomplishing fulfillment of their Alaskan homesteading dreams, but I still find the contrast in location and place interesting as I read her written piece.
By the time my mother was actually on the homestead, and had her ‘dark rainbow dream’ about the horrific wind storm contrasted to how it stopped in her dream when she met the right ‘person’, she had already in her lifetime experienced probably close to 30 moves.
If I could talk to this ‘mental health professional’ I would like to ask what this kind of moving is seen to represent in a person’s life. That the moving, at least in our family, seemed to be connected to and integrated with this ‘pioneering’ drive makes me suspect that it was then connected to the genetic undercurrent that MANY immigrating ‘pioneers’ had within them as they traveled to America in the first place.
But it is hard to feel a part of the mainstream American current with this kind of ‘traveling’ background – and I have certainly done my share of moving around in my adult life, as well. I still haven’t counted my own moves, but I do know that right now being here and staying here in this little house I live in now is the single most important aspect to my own current life.
So when I work in my yard on my adobe projects it is in part the grounding I experience as I work with the physical DIRT that helps me right now. As I looked around me out in my yard this morning I just had this thought: I wish I had thought beforehand that I could have actually encased my mother’s individual letters I have completed transcribing right into those bricks – where they also would have finally met their final grounded end — because they probably would have remained within those bricks for a very, very, very, very LONG time without GOING anywhere.
I have spent too many hours to count on the job of transcribing my mother’s writings today. No adobe work. Just this work. I am nearing the end stretch but not done yet.
This is a link to my mother’s words written about why they decided to move to Alaska and what that process was like. I am glad I found it – it will certainly be near the front of one of the books of her letters. I really hoped she didn’t spiral out into orbit as she wrote this piece – and thankfully she didn’t. She actually seemed to stay on target, which surprised me! You might be interested in taking a look:
My mother’s journal entries during a period in January 1960 when my father went to work out of town and we had to leave the homestead and stay in the rented log house in Eagle River during the time he was gone. She is missing her husband, and the mountain.
I know the feeling she is talking about in the January 23rd entry. I used to call it my ‘wild’ feeling, like the wind could blow right through me. But it’s a longing, a certain inexplicable kind of longing in the soul……
Have you ever felt it?
+++++++++++++++++++++++
January 10, 1960
We had to leave homestead.
January 11, 1960
Baths and children rested and got ready to return to school.
January 12, 1960
Children returned to school. Bill left for [work in] Paxson. Sub-zero weather all week 20 to 25° below – good thing we came down.
January 13, 1959
I’m lost without Bill and children. Jeep won’t start so every day Sharon and I walk to store [staying at log house in Eagle River], mail box etc. – Cold – Br-r – but nice. We bundle up and except for our face we don’t mind. I put a scarf over Sharon’s mouth and we don’t talk – it’s too cold.
January 21, 1960
Cold weather ended days ago! Now between 15° and 20° above. Children – Cindy and John got report cards – Cindy all s’s and John all B’s. I’m pleased.
January 22, 1960
Be so glad when Bill gets home. I miss him terribly. I plan to go to homestead on Monday with Bockstahlers.
January 23, 1960
I can’t explain it to anyone, least of all to myself – this burning aching inside of me that seeks fulfillment – and I only find this peace and serenity and wonder – on our homestead. There I’m happy and here I’m lost – it’s as if I’m meant to be there – high in the mountains – alone with Alaska’s beauty all around me –
Today – I’m going through the motions of keeping house and all but inside I feel as if I want to free myself from bondage – I feelheld and I yearn to be loose – free –
Schools, close to stores and all – still not worth it to me [to be in Eagle River] – I yearn to be home – next winter I wish I could stay.
John is uneasy here – he wishes he were home –
Oh, how I miss Bill – I feel he probably doesn’t miss me in the same way – one letter, only one – oh how I wish he were here with me now –
I wish, I want – WHAT?
I wish I could write – really write – and paint, really paint – like the Goodalls – oh, how great that would be —
+++++++++++++++++++++++
I wrote this note to myself when I transcribed these journal entries a few years ago:
That’s scary that I know this feeling also. James Hillman writes in ‘The Soul’s Code’ about the longing of the soul. He writes about it in reference to loneliness and longing.
Is this longing especially connected to the experience of a soul that, in childhood, did not get to “grown down into the world” or into the child’s body/brain/self correctly?
In a way when this book is published my mother’s words will be published with it, and her wish will become a reality. It is as if the healing had to come first, and the waiting had to happen before that – so that I, her daughter, could commingle my words with hers.
Too bad she was a witch to me! But, then, this book sure wouldn’t be being written if she hadn’t been – all things necessary, as Hillman says.
Some of us are literally lost souls, very lost souls without a home. If we are meant to come to earth and become integrated into a world and into our bodies, and trauma inhibits that process, we are never truly at home in this world. I am almost 56 years old now, and I still am not at home here. Just barely here.
As we wend our way home – I drink in the beauty I see around me and think – “Finally, I’m going HOME.”
I never thought I’d miss a place so remote and strange as this. I remember when I first came and I though “I cannot live this far away! – from people, bright lights and city things. I’ll surely be lonely and afraid.”
But instead a peace came tome – I relaxed and was unafraid.
The road to our homestead is full of bumps. It’s a rough one and has many jolts. But I wouldn’t trade it for a freeway. Smooth, easy riding, swift and modern.
— surely things would not remain the same
The moose and beaver, the squirrels and bear would soon hasten to find new homes. They would be afraid to stay.
Would the sun shine so brightly? If the cities came to us – or would it’s ways be filtered through the city dust.
Would the skies be so clear and blue if the traffic came right through –
Would the air be like wine or would it be choking and would my eyes sting all the time?
I could not bear to stay and see it change –
From a place so serene to one of hustle and bustle – to one of modern ways.
I once thought “I cannot leave the conveniences behind.”
But I found so much to replace them and came to understand . . . .
The beauties that surround us – for all to enjoy – I think of all these things as we wend our way HOME –
I drink in the scenery. I was so thirsty –I’ve been half-starved – since I left this wilderness area.
My heart cries out “Don’t leave again!”
My soul is nurtured and so is my brain.
I look around me – oh, such peace envelopes my body as I sink into bliss –
We’re going HOME
The mountains are etched in rose – just as if a small child – or God had outlined them with a pink crayon –
The sun is setting – so early indeed – as this is Alaska in winter – a scene so different than any I’ve ever seen.
The trees bend down with their burden of snow.
The world is all white except for the sun setting in crimson and gold.
We ride on – and I’m grateful to be going HOME!
– – –
Written by a woman who had come from the city to homestead and although had loved the wilderness had an unaccountable desire to return to the city. She left in the fall and returned in the early winter – never to live elsewhere again.
[Linda note: Not sure if she means with her second reference to ‘city’ it being the log house in Eagle River?]
June 24, 1959 Wednesday – letter from Mother to her mother
Dear Mom,
Just a note to enclose with Sharon’s precious drawings. She loves to work with her pencil and paper and I think does very well. She especially loves to draw houses, people, and Humpty Dumpty and Jack-O-Lanterns – these she brings to me and says “Doesn’t it scare you?” She always writes on her things [scribble lines] very industriously and then reads it to me!!
I’ve been inside for three days – today they’ve been so good and sweet. Bill stayed home to help me – He had a severe case of diarrhea Sunday and yet had promised to bring Pollard up with our tractor to bring down Buttner’s things and went anyways. Oh, Sunday was ‘a peculiar day’! Bill spent all day on that and when finally got home he collapsed on the bed for first time – he never takes time to even sit any more – just go, go, go – I worry over him he’s so THIN now – but anyways – he’d no sooner gone to sleep then I heard a car. Nowno car or jeep has ever been up here since we moved back here. I felt like a desert person in search of water – oasis and all – only me, imagining cars – but sure enough it was a jeep and Pollard driving it so proud to have been the first to make it. He had a couple – oh 45 or so – who had planned to homestead beyond Thomas and land office refused so he was to show them Buttner’s place.
They stopped here and loved it!! She’s quite a character – one boy senior in high school. Both work on base. She kept saying “What will you do in winter?” “Aren’t you afraid of bears?” – And Mom, I felt like a ‘real sourdough’ and old timer as I heard her talk.
They had an old dilapidated looking jeep only paid $150.00 for so didn’t care whether hurt it or not. I sat in back – open with her and went up to Buttner’s. Wanted to see it again.
We thought he’d never make it and were laughing so hard but that old beat up jeep got there!!
All the land is teriffically [sic] scenic on way up and many perfect spots for cabins but it’s all our land.
You don’t get to Buttner’s til you dead-end against mountains and drop off to creek. His was a tiny valley with hills on both sides and view of dead-end of mountains below. Pretty but gives me claustrophobia – which I have lately anyways. (I hate being shut up in this D – HUT!!)
Many bear droppings up there at Buttner’s and it’s scary! I’d want you close to us on your visits not a half mile up there, I’d worry myself sick over you!!
You’ll see when you come. Anyways, her working and all I doubt if they’ll file on it and I bet Buttner wants $ back for his road.
All of Buttner’s land is really mountain – different than ours.
Well, then Bill not feeling well and all he went to bed at 10:00 for first time. I couldn’t sleep (I have terrible insomnia here – all six of us in one room and so light outside and so much on my mind). Anyways again I heard a motor. This time I was really flabbergasted. 10:00 visitors? I rushed to door and sure enough it was Barbee. We got up and I was scared thinking maybe forest fire or something but no, just came for a visit. Now isn’t that something – a freeway no less and Bill didn’t think a jeep could make it. As he says it’s too bad for one and Barbee was shocked at road but didn’t know we didn’t drive it. He’d been out horse back riding and when returned decided he’d stop up to see us – at least four miles of bad road.
Well, I made coffee and we had crackers and cheese. Thank goodness for my redwood furniture for visitors to sit on outdoors as I can’t bring them in with all four children asleep in one room.
He left shortly and we undressed and went back to bed.
Well, Bill tried to drive last night but too tough on our jeep.
Bill stayed home Monday – still didn’t feel well.
I planted some more vegetables (really too late now and Oh Mom, tomatoes can’t be grown here except in hot house – nor can cucumbers or corn). It’s a shame! But thanks anyways.
Monday late we had rain – had our first real thunderstorm here in Alaska Saturday and rain! Torrents of rain.
I had stomach aches. Tuesday Bill returned to work and I felt weak and poor. John had stomach aches and Cindy poor darling, had RUNS all day! – and No bathroom. You just can’t imagine how terrible and pouring rain outside and all our wood wet. Terrible day. Poor Sharon was sickest and scared me so. She went every 15 minutes and threw up even water at same time and then went into deep sleep. I don’t know what I would have done without John and Linda. They helped me gt meals and read stories to Cindy and poor Linda even helped me gather wood and empty ‘potty’. She never was at all sick but tonight said had a stomach ache so tomorrow she’ll probably have it too.
Last night I was sick, discouraged, lovely and blue. This Damn hut got me down. I had fixed place up and cleaned up before Bill got home but then Cindy threw up buckets and I didn’t have heart to cook dinner and was too weak by then.
I got to thinking and all I wanted was to see all of you. I’d been blue for days anyways.
Mom – not even a battery radio here – I haven’t even heard the radio or seen T.V. since March!!!
Oh, it will be worth it and on sunny days it’s nice but I do get lonely and I can’t go anywhere myself – I don’t even dare to walk for fear of bears.
The grass and all is four feet tall now!
Yesterday we were in a fog and cloud – I couldn’t see at all and even hated to go off to empty potty. Very depressing, scarey [sic] and blue.
Last night for first time I cried and cried. I truly hated it here then and knew you must never try it alone. Last night I felt imprisoned with a seven month sentence! It’s rather like that.
We’re so financially strapped and can’t even go to a movie alone. I hadn’t been since January first and other day – last week we took kids and went. I was so tired by time it was over and couldn’t enjoy movie knowing we had 14 mile trip to Eagle River and 14 miles ‘back in’ and then the damn tractor ride. We were all dressed up and it’s pretty awful to have to stop and put on old clothes and mosquito repellant and all on for last one mile stretch and then sit in two-wheel open trailer –
UGH!
Well last night I’d had it. I told Bill I’d pay 1,000 to see you and Charlie and Carolyn.
I wanted to go to Carolyn’s [her sister-in-law in Los Angeles] and have a peanut butter sandwich (hers are so delicious always!) and iced coffee and sit on her patio like we used to.
I planned how I’d come and surprise you!
Well, Bill said O.K. I could come – Air Force would pay but I’m scared to fly – imagine me being here and I’m scared to fly and then I’d lose one month here and have to stay longer in winter and I’d need $ for a few clothes for kids and Bill would be all alone (he’d probably accomplish far more!)
Well today I had the RUNS and weak? Oh, OH, OH. I’ve been so sick to my stomach you’d swear I was pregnant.
Bill stayed home and helped. He did dishes (first time here and now can sympathize with me having to heat water and all) and got breakfast and lunch. I couldn’t eat.
Tonight I’m better and the runs have stopped.
We can hear the creek, the waterfalls and the river – they’re all so full after the rain. The clouds have lifted and all is sweet and beautiful outside.
I love it here and someday we’ll have our road and house – but oh, how lonesome I am for all of you. It’s all I want – to see you and then return.
It’s been a big change – moving here and living like this – it piles up on you!!
Well, this turned out to be a long letter and I feel better for writing it!
I miss YOU and love YOU!
Shall I come?
I could OR would you rather come here.
I hate to travel with all four.
Bill won’t have vacation now until next summer.
His two years are up now and if he reenlists [with the civilian Army Corp of Engineers] (signs up for two more) then we’re entitled to come to California and back free – and then in another two years – otherwise he loses it.
Help me decide.
Probably I should stay here!
Love
Children’s books arrived but I’ve been too sick to look at them but will. Thanks!
P.S. I’d like to drive down and Bill says NO!
P.S. II We’ve had glorious weather and I’m tanned and so are kids. We needed the rain – hope we’ll have more sun though.
Hope you can decipher – written hurriedly by kerosene lamp you sent.
Can you send me some sleeping pills?
++++
I wonder if we didn’t often suffer from food poisoning from lack of refrigeration. I’ve NEVER had a stomach ache since I left home like I (and the rest of the family) had while we were growing up.
The ‘hut’ was the canvas covered Jamesway like a Quonset – I have a disk of slides my brother sent down from Alaska that I have yet to take a look at, will post those homesteading pics when I do
Still ahead of the hoped for, planned for summer rains of July! Adobe work continues and here’s a little guided walking tour for today – after reading my mother’s letters about TOMBOY me as a little girl, I suppose I should post here a sign WARNING TOMBOY AT WORK!
Short adobe wall around the Mulberry tree, probably the ONLY place I will allow Bermuda grass to thrive. In that triangle to the left are more tomatoes and two furrows of carrots! Two of the neighbor boys scampered over last week with their precious package of carrot seeds that their father had bought them. The seven-year-old planted 1/3 of the pack, rest to be planted later in the garden I am forming today after the rains come.Made some extra bricks yesterday, first in a long time I've had extra dirt, have to lay them down on cloth so they don't damage underlying walkway. Color is off on this one, that's the Pomegranate which also got its own little all around it yesterday, has mulch under it. To the left at lower corner will also be another contained garden. There are little glass half-marbles embedded in the adobe mortar between bricks on right.Another contained garden area 'growing' there to the left looking south. My poor chairs, were free, but plastic gets eaten by sun here and they have no bottoms! There by the tree I am making an adobe bench - far more durable when done!Tomatoes down there to the right of center wall, am working on next contained garden to the leftShovel and level are providing temporary stability to board-form for triangle joining blockLaying a single-block-wide stepping path down the center of next contained garden - good soil is too expensive and valuable to waste where footsteps pack the groundThere's a little cedar tree there in the small contained garden that my sister in Texas brought me. Hope is that it will continue to grow as the Mulberry dies and can replace it for shade - though not in my lifetime. Also planted two Stargazer lily bulbs in there yesterday ($4 each on sale!)
Stop the Storm 
You must be logged in to post a comment.