1
TRADITIONS
The sweet scent of coconut pancakes draws me from the edge of sleep. I
smile, knowing my mother is standing in the kitchen downstairs mixing batter,
no doubt wearing a few clumps of it in her coal black hair. I toss my denim
quilt aside, cool air whisking across my skin, and blink against the warm light
of dawn that filters through the old lace curtain panel covering my window and
sets the worn wood floor of my room aglow. The constant autumn rain must have
finally offered a reprieve. My mother will be happy to see it. She’s convinced
a clear sunrise on a person’s birthday is a sign of good things to come.
As I pull on jeans and a shirt, Dad’s laughter rumbles up the stairs,
and then the fire alarm chirps. Mom has probably burned a pancake on the
griddle.
In the kitchen, Dad is opening the window behind the sink, and Mom is
perched on one foot in a wooden chair with her back to me, stretching to fan
the smoke away from the alarm.
“I swear this thing is too sensitive,” she mutters. There’s a streak of
flour on her hip and a glob of batter on the sleeve of her T-shirt. My mother
can forecast rain better than any meteorologist. She can predict the approach
of a gust of wind a few minutes before it roars across the Shenandoah Valley,
but she can’t cook to save her life.
There are three plates on the table. Two of them are still empty. Mine
has a short stack of blobby pancakes and a streak of runaway butter. A couple
charred pancakes are tossed on the counter, and one more is on the floor at the
foot of the trash can.
My dad grins at her over his shoulder and catches sight of me standing
in the door.
“Happy birthday, Tanzy!” he says. “It’s the big eighteen. You know,
Hope, Tanzy’s an adult now. You should make her do the cooking,” he teases, and
snaps a washcloth in my direction. His smile is all teeth, and his amber eyes
glitter. It’s the one physical trait we share. Otherwise, I don’t look much
like either of my parents.
“I’ve made her coconut pancakes for her birthday every birthday since she
was six. She may not be home for her birthday next year.” Mom’s chin quivers.
She presses her lips together.
“I’ll come home for my birthday, Mom.” I slide into my seat and shovel
in a bite. It isn’t cooked all the way through, but it’s warm, and sweet enough
to chew and swallow without making too much of a face.
“Thank you, Tanzy,” she says, casting a mock glare at my dad. He winks
at me before disappearing through the door that leads to the back porch. He
reappears less than a minute later with two mason jars full of wild flowers.
“For my girls,” he says, and places one on the window sill and the
other in the middle of the kitchen table. “Birthdays are big days for moms,
too.”
“Travis, when did you pick these? Did you leave any flowers in the
garden?” Mom arranges the blossoms with her nimble fingers, and then leans into
them, breathing deep.
“Why do you think I got up early this morning? It’s freezing out
there,” he says, watching her. “Weatherman said the temp is going to drop
overnight and the whole valley will be covered in frost tomorrow morning.
They’ll all be dead in twenty-four hours anyway.”
“Weatherman is wrong,” she replies, one corner of her mouth curling up.
Dad snorts. “We’ll see.” He rolls his eyes, but I know he believes her.
“Eat up, Tanzy. We have a lot to do today.”
“Tanzy has school today,” Mom replies.
“You cook her coconut pancakes, and then she comes with me to the farm.
You have your tradition, we have ours.” He winks at me. “Besides, she’s a
senior. Isn’t the rest of this school year just for show? And who says she’s
going to college? What if she decides to ride professionally?”
“Travis Hightower,” Mom scolds. “We’ll argue about this tomorrow. As
for today, stick to tradition.” She wipes her hands on the front of her pants.
“But make sure you pick up any homework assignments while you’re out. And
please get home before dark. I made a dinner reservation for six p.m.”
Dad makes a face. “Isn’t that a little early?”
“I’m pretty sure that’s when normal people eat dinner,” I say, and then
choke down a sticky clump of semi-cooked batter.
“We are as normal as normal gets,” Dad replies. “We’ll do our best,
honey. Let’s get a move on, Tee. I’ll take my breakfast to go.” Dad kisses mom
on the cheek, scoops a fresh stack of pancakes onto a paper towel with one hand
and picks up his metal coffee mug with the other, and then heads through the
back door toward the truck.
“Have fun,” Mom concedes, “and please be careful.” She glances out the
window at the streaked sky and gnaws on her bottom lip. Her fingernails tap a
quick rhythm on the countertop. I take my plate to the kitchen sink and follow
her gaze to the glowing dawn. I wonder what she sees in it, and why she seems
to hunt it for answers every morning.
“We’ll be fine, Mom,” I offer.
“I know.”
“Thanks for breakfast,” I say. “I really will come back every year, no
matter where I go after graduation. Nobody does coconut pancakes like you do.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.” She looks at me, blinking rapidly. “Now go,
the day’s wasting,” she says, and then turns back to the sun. I steal one more
glimpse of her, and follow Dad to the truck.
We ride in silence for the first few minutes. Dad rolls up the pancakes
with one hand so he can eat them like a burrito while he drives. Once he
finishes, he wipes his mouth with the paper towel and then tucks it into the
pocket of his flannel shirt.
“I don’t know why you like those,” he says, and sucks at his teeth.
“I haven’t liked them since I was about ten,” I admit.
Dad lets out a honk of a laugh. “You’re a good girl, Tanzy,” he says.
He turns up the volume on his favorite radio station to listen to the morning
show. The voices fade in and out for the first few minutes as we make our way
to the main road. The radio host’s voice becomes audible, announcing the beginning
of the routine Science Fact or Fiction Friday segment.
“With us today is Dr. Andrews, who has a rather extraordinary theory
about light and lightning, and some compelling studies to back up her claims.
Dr. Andrews, thank you for joining us.”
“Thank you for having me,” she answers.
“So Dr. Andrews, give us your science fact.”
“Did you know that the human eye sees less than one percent of the
color spectrum, and our ears hear less than one percent of the sound spectrum?”
“No, I did not.”
“What do you think is in all that clear, all that quiet?”
Dad glances at the radio dial as if checking the station.
“I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it,” the host answers.
“What if I was to tell you that there’s an entirely separate world in
the clear, undetectable by human senses.”
“A world?” the host repeats. I shift in my seat.
“Yes, a world,” the woman continues. “A world happening around us all
the time. It has been operating alongside ours like two plays on one stage.”
“Do you have proof of this world?”
“None that you’d believe,” she replies. A chill of interest conjures
goose bumps from my elbows to my wrist. I pull the sleeves on my jacket down to
cover my knuckles.
“Well it’s pretty safe to invent something that you claim you can’t
prove.”
“There’s nothing safe about it,” she answers.
“I’m not sure what this has to do with light or lightning.” The host’s
voice raises an octave, and his question sounds more like an accusation. I lean
toward the dash.
“Lightning and other weather events aren’t random. They’re tools of—”
“Okay, that’s all the nonsense I can take for one morning,” Dad
interjects, his voice filling the cab, and turns the knob on the radio until a
country song comes in clear enough to recognize. “Ruined my morning show and my
drive,” he grumbles. “Let’s hope your mom didn’t hear that woman spreading her
paranoid crap. She’ll stuff our house with furniture from floor to ceiling just
to take up all the empty space. A world in the clear.” He huffs. “What’s wrong
with these radio shows and news reports anymore? All they do is try to stir
people up. They’ll give any nut a microphone and air time so long as it’ll get
a reaction out of somebody.”
My gaze drifts out of my window, and to the clear air whistling by the
car as we wind down a tree lined road, soaring skyward until it fades to black
thousands of miles above us. Maybe it’s just the sound of the tires grinding
against the asphalt vibrating through the bottom of the old Ford truck, or the
whine of air curling around the hood, but the silence seems fuller than it did
a moment ago.
“You are your mother’s daughter,” Dad says softly. “Don’t give wild
hares prime real estate in your head. Your mom thinks her fears keep her safe,
that they prepare her. All fear does is build walls, Tanzy—walls she can’t break because she’s convinced herself they’re useful.”
“I can cook. And I would rather be outside than inside,” I say, listing
off the first two differences I can think of between my mother and me. I can’t
imagine islanding myself at home the way she does. We only have one vehicle
because she doesn’t like to drive and won’t go anywhere alone. In the last
year, the walls of my room, of every room in our house, have felt a little
closer in than they did before, the ceilings lower, too. Still, my heart sinks.
I have felt the rabbit of nervousness race through me with nothing prompting
the chase. What if, one day, I need walls the way she does?
“Before you came along, your mom couldn’t stand to spend a whole day
inside. Hell, even a single lazy morning would make her agitated, and she’d
need to go for a ride. Then she had that bad fall, and she didn’t want to have
another one. Taking a risk has a higher price tag attached to it when you have
someone depending on you. And it’s not just that. Being a parent changes things—changes
everything. You see the world through the eyes of someone whose sole purpose
becomes keeping a tiny, helpless baby safe. This world we’re in has more sharp edges and teeth than you realize.”
“Now who’s paranoid?” I smile at him.
“You’ll see one day, if you decide to have a kid of your own,” he says,
his gaze following the nose of the truck as he makes a turn.
“That’s a big if,” I say.
“It’s also a long ways off. It better be, anyway.” He winks.
“Dad, seriously.” I fold my arms across my front. “But is Mom . . . is
she okay? I know me leaving next year is hard on her. But she wants me to go,
doesn’t she?”
“Of course she does. She’ll feel better once you know what you want to
do and where you’re going. It’s the unknown that bothers her most. But you
don’t need to worry about her. She’s stronger than you could ever imagine. I
think when you have to raise yourself like she did, well, it shapes your
perspective.”
“What really happened to her parents? I know you guys have said no one
knows, but I always thought maybe it was some secret you were keeping until I
was an adult or something. I am eighteen now.” I raise an eyebrow, and try to
keep my tone light.
“It’s just something your mom isn’t willing to talk about. It took me a
long time to accept it, and it’s natural for you to be curious. That’s a piece
of your family and your history, too. But whatever it is, your mom keeps it
from us for her own reasons, and I have learned to respect that.”
“I know.” I bite at the inside of my cheek, my mind still digging at
the dark place in my mother’s past. I’m not as curious about who the people
were in her life as I am interested in who she was during it.
I stare at the eastern horizon. Dad has watched the sunrise through the
windshield of his truck on this drive to Wildwood Horse Farm six days a week
for as long as I can remember. Nested against the west side of Virginia’s
Shenandoah Valley, the sunrises are long and spectacular. Mostly, so are the
days. The sun comes up. The horses eat. Some of them are worked through
training exercises, some are shown to potential buyers, and the rest are turned
loose to run in the pasture. Stalls are cleaned. Water buckets are filled.
Aisles are swept. Students are taught. The horses eat again. The sun goes down.
He drives home. Aside from the sun, Dad controls everything at Wildwood. He is
the head trainer there, and the biggest gear in the proverbial clock, making
the other parts turn.
Next year will be different. Where will I be? Mornings will either find
me in a saddle, working to climb the rungs of the international show jumping
circuit, or sitting in a desk with a college text book propped open in front of
me. Either way, it won’t be here in this truck. It’s hard to imagine my world
changing so unequivocally while theirs remains the same, save my absence.
We pull into the parking lot at Wildwood Farm. We are the first car
here. Dad could turn over the first daily chores to the staff, but he likes to
be the one to start each day, to see how each horse has come through the night,
and wants to be the one to discover anything out of the ordinary, not be told
about it secondhand.
Today, the morning runs like clockwork. I am allowed to come to the
farm for my birthday, but I’m certainly not allowed to throw off the farm’s routine.
I wouldn’t want it to. The routine is a heartbeat, a living thing, breathing
life into the cracked concrete aisles and faded barn walls. A horse farm isn’t
wood and sand and grass and steel. It’s the movement that happens around and in
and on the wood and sand and grass and steel.
After a quick lunch, we unload a tractor trailer’s worth of alfalfa
into the hay shed. My dad throws a bale of hay like most people toss laundry
into a hamper—easy and mindless. I grit my teeth to keep from
grunting with the effort it takes to try to keep up with him. By the time we’re
halfway through, sweat beads along my scalp and trickles into my ears. The
radio show from this morning resurfaces in my mind. Dad’s right, that woman was
a loon. She’s probably never worked a day on a farm, never felt the ache of
real labor, the release of exhaustion. If she’d just look around at her own
world, maybe she wouldn’t need to invent something invisible, and impossible to
prove or disprove.
My thoughts drift to my mother. I don’t know how different I would be
if I grew up without parents or any family to speak of. Who would she be if
she’d had the security of walls and home-cooked meals, no matter how badly they
were burned? I wish she’d tell me about her life growing up, and I wish she
would want to be here with us on days like this. Maybe a hard day of farm work
is exactly what she needs to remember that life doesn’t always have a twist
lurking around every corner.
Dad waves at the driver as the empty rig pulls up the driveway.
“Do you want to take Teague and Harbor for a ride in the woods, Tanzy?”
he asks. “It’s the first pretty day we’ve had in a while. It’s not going to
last, though. The radar looks busy again in about an hour.”
I pause, studying his face for any sign he’s kidding. I still have
stalls to clean, and he has three client horses on the schedule for training
sessions. Dana McDaniel, his assistant manager, has the day off. Not to mention
my mother expects us home at a decent hour. There’s no time for a leisure ride
on our own horses.
“Your mom was right. This might be your last birthday at home for a
while, depending on where you are next year. We should make the most of it,” he
continues.
“Okay,” I answer slowly, waiting for him to change his mind or list off
what we need to take care of before we tack our horses. Instead, he retrieves
his helmet from his office and heads to his horse’s stall. I hustle to Harbor’s
stall, buckle her halter, and jog down the aisle to where Dad has tied Teague
for tacking.
“We haven’t done this in too long, Tanzy,” he says on an exhale as we
finish fitting the bridles to our horses. “Life is short. Too short. Sometimes
you have to slow down and take in the view. I don’t care what that whack job
said on the radio this morning. A big clear sky is one of my favorite things on
earth, and I think we should go enjoy a little piece of it. Let’s ride up the
ridge. I bet the river is up high with all this rain we’ve had.”
“Are you sure we have time? Mom did say to stick to tradition. Leaving
work behind . . .” I trail off and glance back at his office door, imagining
the to-do list printed on the whiteboard. It’s only half-done. “Well, it’s not
tradition,” I finish. My middle stirs and twists. Is this just one of the wild
hares dad was talking about before? Is this how it all starts, and then one day
I’m staring out my window at the sun, reading its color and clarity for omens
of the day to come? My entire life is going to change in a matter of months.
Change is a good thing.
“Maybe it’s time we start a new tradition. A birthday trail ride sounds
like a good one. Are you coming?” Dad asks.
I steel myself with a quick breath in. Harbor peers at me, black eyes
round and soft. “Yep, here we come,” I say, and lead her down the hall.
Caitlin
Sangster grew up in the back woods of California and would rather go hiking,
running, swimming, or general outdoorsing than just about anything else. If
there aren’t any mountains, it doesn’t count as a real place. At eighteen, she
moved to XinJiang, and at twenty-one it was Taiwan. She did eventually buckle
down and graduate from Brigham Young University with a BA in Asian Studies and
is now that person you avoid at parties because she'll probably start talking
about Shang dynasty oracle bones.
