Of All the Landscapes her Life has led her Through by Dawn Tasaka Steffler
this is her favorite; there’s something about the windsweptness of this coastline. Scruffy trees bent from wind the sharp smell of cold. On a cliff overlooking the ocean she has created a sort of nest: dog-eared books a child’s threadbare security blanket a college sweatshirt.
On the beach below her family are small like ants. They are far enough away that she can hear their voices—we’re out of laundry detergent again, have you seen my glasses, can someone please walk the dog, what’s for dinner—but they can’t paw at her. Here she can rest. Nest. Sometimes she looks down at the beach and sees her youngest son looking up hands shading his eyes hoping to catch a glimpse of her.
That boy. Restless little birdie who circled her head like a halo despite the fact she already had one of each: sweet-tempered, thumb-sucking boy angelic girl who slept through the night at six-months. Only masochists and mooncalves have three babies in five years, right? One landscape that keeps coming back to her: peak summer three on one no kindergarten no preschool. Engine idling hands clenched eyes scrunched closed sweat dripping down her back. And her three chicks in the backseat overtired. Her too. Peak time for seagull chorus, Mom Mom Mom Mom Mom. And she eagle screeched back at them, shut up shut up can you all just shut the fuck up! Their bodies froze. Like fawns in tall grass. But she had to teach them how to not need her so much, didn’t she?
Compared to that place this cliff is a sanctum. A citadel. She understands now why crones and wizards live on mountaintops. She can see when the dark clouds gather on the horizon she knows when storms will hit. So much rain. It drops the temperature to a pleasant chill that cools her sweaty body.
And whenever she misses her family she just goes down to the beach. Helps out with chores, plays with the dog, goes into town with them for milk, fruit, and glistening raw meat on pink Styrofoam trays covered in cling wrap. But her windswept shore is never far. It sends a breeze that tickles her neck with a strand of her own hair. Her armpits smell like kelp. And when she inexplicably lifts a deep green zucchini to her ear at the farmer’s market, she can hear the ocean.
Author's Note:
Recently, I reconnected with a really tough, but beloved, yoga teacher after twenty years away. Initially, I was motivated to return because I knew she would help me keep my body strong, and have a good quality of life for as long as possible. But a more important, and surprising, benefit is that my mid-day yoga class forces me to disengage with my desk, my brain, and my writerly goals. I love the strenuous quiet and the sweaty exhaustion afterward. The occasional sweet treat I allow myself to have post-class (like a McDonald’s soft serve ice cream cone or Jamba Juice Orange Dream Machine smoothie) isn’t bad either.
Dawn Tasaka Steffler is an Asian-American writer from Hawaii who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is the Nonfiction Editor for Pithead Chapel, and is currently working an irreverent collection about menopausal women. Find out more at dawntasakasteffler.com.
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