“Katia,” a woman wearing a tie-dyed caftan calls out. She holds up an orange for her daughter, but the girl shakes her head and goes back to her sand dollars. “Forget trying to get her to eat when she’s playing,” the woman says to me when she notices me smiling at her child.
“Yeah. She’s adorable, though.”
“Thank you.” She starts to peel the orange, then stops and gazes out to the ocean. “It sure is pretty here, isn’t it. Do you live in the area?”
“No, just on holiday. I live in West Vancouver.”
“Ah. Nice.” She nods, communicating none of the judgment I sometimes encounter on mention of my wealthy suburb. “Katia and I, we’re just passing through, camping at the campground down the beach. She starts kindergarten next year, so I figured we should try to have a few adventures first. Just the two of us, you know?”
Her face disappears under her caftan as she removes it over her head, and I notice that there’s no wedding ring on her hand. I think about Mom, who was similar to this woman in many ways, and of the short time I was a single mother myself. How drastically my life has changed since then.
I have been with my husband, Remy, for four years, and on this third attempt I have finally gotten marriage right. My realization that I was repeating my mother’s patterns in love was a good starting point, but it meant tearing everything apart and going back to the beginning. Four months after splitting up with James, I typed my relationship wish list into an online dating profile like an employer’s want ad. Three weeks later, I went on my first date with Remy, and by the time we left the restaurant my mind was spinning with disbelief at how perfect we seemed for each other. Not only was our connection immediate, he was everything I had ever hoped for: funny, successful, intelligent, affectionate, well traveled, tall and handsome. I thought about my mother, who had once promised herself she would find a good man and then promptly met my father. Almost like a miracle, she had said, and I felt exactly the same way about Remy.
In the beginning, when we talked about our past, I usually steered the conversation back to him. It wasn’t for lack of my desire or his interest in discussing mine; it was more that I sensed that with this man, I would delve deeper than I had with anyone else, and I first needed to be certain our love was as real as I believed it was. I told him the basics: that I was a child of a hippie family, that I was twice divorced and currently flat broke, that I was looking for not just a life partner but an active stepfather for my son. He took it all in stride with humor and sensitivity. Then, three months into our relationship, I handed him a draft of the memoir I’d been working on for a couple of years and asked him not to call me until he’d finished it. I spent that day nervously cleaning my apartment, filled with paranoia as I imagined his horror and/or disgust at my past.
Seven hours later, he rang my doorbell and pulled me into his arms. He loved me even more for everything I had been through, he said, and his words were like warm water washing decades of dirt from my skin.
He drops down beside me on the blanket now and puts his hand on my thigh. “Hey, babe. Everything under control?”
“Yeah, sure.” I turn to him and smile, still amazed by my attraction to him. “But I think Em needs more sunscreen on his face.” I pass him the bottle, and he jogs over to the boys.
The woman beside me is having a discussion with her daughter about a pogo stick. The girl clearly wants one, but her mother doesn’t mince words. Not only is she too small for a pogo stick, she tells her child pragmatically, but they can’t afford to buy toys and eat too. My heart pinches a little.
I rise to join the boys. They’re involved in a serious game of tag now, weaving crazily to evade each other’s touch. As my husband passes by me, he brushes my lips with a kiss.
My children’s laughter fills the air. Gulls circle overhead. I stand with sand beneath my feet and the sun warm on my head. There’s rarely a moment of this life of mine that goes by unappreciated.
THE SUN IS GETTING lower in the sky. It’s close to dinnertime, and the tide is coming in. Soon it will increase to a rush, flooding the beach to erase the day’s sand shapes. I collect buckets, shovels, sand molds, granola bar wrappers and sunscreen bottles. I shove everything into my enormous beach bag and then pick up my blanket and shake off the sand. I’ve already called to Remy and the boys several times, but nobody seems anxious to go inside.
“Cea,” a voice calls, and I look around. My father is holding Ayla, still sleepy from her nap, in his arms.
“Hi, Dad. Look who’s finally up!” I take my baby daughter and kiss her cheeks. She smiles, blue eyes sparkling, and kicks her legs excitedly. “That was a long break. Thank you,” I say to my father. “She did well with you. She obviously adores her grandpa.”
“That makes me feel good,” Dad says, and our eyes meet briefly.
I know we’re both thinking of that moment frozen in time forty years ago, me arching away from him while he grins gamely, but we no longer need to talk about it. Over the past few years, we’ve discussed everything there is to discuss and rehashed everything there is to rehash. And somewhere along the way, my father became one of my favorite people on earth. This development has helped me redefine my family, because the Persons are all gone from my life now. I’ve lost contact with my aunts, and two weeks before Emerson was born, Grandma Jeanne passed away in her sleep. I hold on to my last name, knowing that when I die, it will likely die with me. It’s a thought that saddens me, and yet I’m proud to be the one carrying it to the grave.
The woman and child beside me are getting ready to leave. The little girl is pitching a fit, saying she wants to build one more sandcastle and that she hates their tent. The mother is trying to keep her own emotions in check, but her eyes look defeated. I want to say something to her, but I’m not sure what.
Since becoming a parent myself, I can relate to my mother’s struggles so much better. Even if I may not always find forgiveness toward her in my heart, I do find understanding. I am forty-two years old, not just years but generations older than Mom was when she had me, and I truly wonder how she coped at such a young age. I know the sound of a baby who won’t stop screaming for hours, of a toddler in the throes of a flailing tantrum, of a child who questions my every decision. But somehow she held it together, refusing to abandon me, and she gave me what she could. Not a stable home or routine mealtimes or princess-themed birthday parties, perhaps, but absolute acceptance and the gift of a parent who showed me how, despite her fear, to move quickly past obstacles and face whatever may be coming around the next bend. There is a unique strength born from a youth spent longing for something different. I think about my own children, knowing they will never wish for a home with walls that don’t billow in the wind, a night in an abandoned farmhouse, a day free from pot smoke, or their mother’s attention. And honestly, I’m not convinced that this is entirely a good thing.
My baby girl bears no resemblance to my mother. All the same, when I look at Ayla, I see Mom smiling at me, and I can’t help believing that perhaps her spirit sent my daughter to me as atonement for her own wrongs as a mother. How poetic, in both its simplicity and complexity, if it were true. I kiss the top of Ayla’s sun-warmed head, and suddenly I know what I want to say to the woman beside me. It isn’t anything profound, but it’s the truth, and sometimes that’s enough to make a difference. I wait until her daughter calms down a little, and then I catch her eye.
My family and me today in Vancouver: Ayla, Remy, Emerson, myself, and Avery. PHOTO CREDIT: PAUL GAGNON
“You’re doing a fantastic job,” I say to her directly. “My mom was young and single too, and you know what? I couldn’t have had a more memorable childhood.”
“Thank you,” the woman says, and she sounds grateful.
I put Ayla over my shoulder, stand up and call to my boys. My family gathers around me, my husband and father and children, and my creation is complete.
This is my normal.
Acknowledgments
H
aving given birth to three children (and found the experience considerably less taxing than the nearly seven years it took me to write this memoir!), I can’t help but compare the many people who helped me breathe life into North of Normal with the creation of human life.
The embryo of this book is my memories of the experiences I’ve wanted to share for as long as I can remember.
The bones are the many friends, family and enthusiastic acquaintances who offered support for my project and/or read versions of my manuscript: Aaron Greaves, Bernadette Burns, Bernadette Ruddy, Bruce Adams, Camilla and Magnus Nedfors, Cathleen Baenziger, Christian Benzing, Christine Haebler, Christopher Rummery, Cori Creed, the Gagnon family, Erik Hammerum, Jane Clark, Joel Iseman, Liisa Wagner, LucyAnne Botham, Lynn Schooler, Martin Wood, Meghan Black, Michelle Morgan, Monica Loeffler, Nick Captain, Roberta Burns, Romy Kozak, Rowena Gates, Sierra Perry, Sven Grueber, Tammy Lorence and Tisha Bryant; Linda Schneider, for her love and absolute faith in me; Megan Burns, for her open-mindedness to my history; Sharron Chatterton, for her dedication to my grandfather and advocacy of his story being told; my father-in-law, Rene, who helped me find many much-needed hours to work; Dianne Wood, for her invaluable help and remarkable history with my grandfather; my “Boat Club” gals, Amanda Tapping, Janet Allan and Jenny Drake, who all cheered for me so fiercely; my beautiful friends Amanda Lupis, Cynthia Merriman, Jennifer Park, Lisa Rose Snow, Susan Scarlett, Traci Hansen-Crivici and Tracy Comessotti, who supplied wine and encouragement at our countless chat sessions over the years; and of course, my longtime girls—Carleigh Kage for decades of loyalty and laughter, Heather Greaves for her steadfast belief in me and incredible spirit, Nicole Oliver for her allegiance and generosity, Shannon Nering for her inspiration and exemplary listening skills, Suzana Rummery for her humor, realness and admirable courage, and Wendy McDevitt for her warmth and shining light. I can’t express how much your friendships have meant to me throughout this writing process.
The eyes of this book are Scott Steedman, whose input helped me immensely in my search for an agent. The lungs are my literary agent, Jackie Kaiser at Westwood Creative Artists, whose belief in me has been transformational . . . not to mention that she’s also the loveliest woman on earth to work with. The skin are the teams at both HarperCollins Canada and HarperCollins USA, who created beautiful designs for my story. And the brains are my fantastic editors: Iris Tupholme, whose invaluable insight and attention to detail inspired me to create the best version of my manuscript possible; Claire Wachtel, whose enthusiasm for my story renewed my creative forces; and Noelle Zitzer, Doug Richmond, Hannah Wood and Allyson Latta, for their hard work and encouragement. I feel truly blessed to have had the honor of working with all of you.
It is my family who form the muscles and heart of North of Normal: my father, who had the strength to read my story, cry about it and then give me his blessing to release it to the world. My husband, Remy, whose unfailing love, support, humor and strength as a partner are something I never thought I would find in this lifetime; I can truthfully say that I could not have completed this project without him. And of course, my heart of hearts—my three amazing children, Avery, Emerson and Ayla, who often sat on me, around me or in me (and sometimes all three!) as I wrote.
The folks who crossed my family’s path during my childhood and now find their place within these pages are the lifeblood of this book; thank you for sharing in our adventures.
If our bodies have spirits, and I believe that they do, the soul of this memoir would be the Persons: Mom, Papa Dick, Grandma Jeanne, my aunts and uncle. Thank you for giving me such an extraordinary story to tell.
I must also thank a woman I have never met: Jeannette Walls, whose incredible memoir The Glass Castle inspired me to finally tell my story, which had been living unwritten inside of me for most of my life.
You have all helped me create a body of work that I can be proud of. Welcome to the world, baby book!
About the Author
Cea Sunrise Person, a happily married mother of three, supported herself from age thirteen to thirty-one as an international model, working primarily in Europe. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.
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Copyright
NORTH OF NORMAL. Copyright © 2014 by Cea Sunrise Person. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
All photographs are courtesy of the author except where noted.
Originally published in a slightly different form in Canada in 2014 by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
FIRST U.S. EDITION
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for.
ISBN 978-0-06-228986-5
EPUB Edition © JULY 2014 ISBN 9780062289889
14 15 16 17 18 IND/RRD 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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North of Normal- A memoir of my wilderness childhood, my unusual family, and how I survived both Page 28