if the earth is a woman

a story about my Grandmother Mona

My belly presses against the earth, squishy and soft. My belly that was formed inside my Mother’s belly, also squishy and soft, sometimes round and taut, sometimes shrinking, sometimes expanding like the moon. My Mother, Ruth who decided one day she would like to bring life into the world. My mother who created me, grew me, birthed me, fed me, protected me. My mother who made the choice I would never make.

I existed, as we all did, as a tiny seed of potential inside my mother, and in turn inside my grandmother.

My Mothers Mother was called Mona. She was sweet natured and intelligent, shy and often self deprecating.

When my brother and I were children we would visit her at her house in Norwich, a simple terrace house that smelled faintly of lavender. I was captivated by the Japanese furniture, paintings and delicate sculptures made of ivory that would have travelled with her from her birthplace of Yokohama, Japan to the grey shores of Southampton.

‘That was before Ivory was banned’ my Mum told me.

The first thing I’d do was run upstairs and look through her jewellery box. I always loved rummaging through hidden drawers, sometimes with embarrassing consequences. As a child I was constantly seeking, on the continuous quest for what I never quite knew.

I loved visiting Mona. She was always interested in what I had to say and encouraging about my haphazard attempts to sing and play music. She sat through squeaky recorder recitals and patiently taught me how to play Silent Night on piano. We were similar in many ways. I was a quiet and rather cautious child, unlike my brother Robin who would tear around the house bouncing from the walls.

In my eyes my brother Robin wasn’t afraid of anything. He’d jump from the impossibly high bridge into the rushing River Wye and scale the tallest trees. He thought nothing of attaching himself to death defying rope swings and catapulting himself into the air. He never hesitated. I would always stand at the top watching him with furrowed brow, biting my nails. Robin had a huge amount of physical skill and prowess which always left me feeling rather inadequate. When he was 11 he intentionally went out to the ‘haunted house’, a ruined cottage in the woods half an hour walk from our house in the middle of the night to see what it would feel like to be scared. Whilst I lay in my cosy warm bed, too afraid to sleep with the light off in case the ‘black ghost’ I’d convinced myself lived outside my window would come and get me.

I, on the other hand was too scared of the ‘black ghost’ that I thought lived outside my window to sleep with the light off, in my own cosy warm bed, with my parents downstairs. Years later someone said to me ‘Robin is one of the most impressive people I’ve ever met.’ it’s true!

I remember never-ending car journeys to Norwich. Mum would sometimes buy us sweets and then wish she hadn’t. Robin would always save his sweets. I’d eat them all in minutes and then cajole him to share. He never did. He always bought his BMX, or skateboard, or soap shoes for sliding down railings and would convince whoever was around to take him to the nearest railing/skate park to burn off all his excess energy as soon as possible. I was happy to sit curled up in the window seat all day, reading and sucking my thumb.

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Mona was born in Yokohama, Japan on 10th January 1922.

Her parents, my great-grandparents, who died long before I was born made the arduous journey by boat across the seas from England in the early 1900’s. Japan held promises of opportunity that England never could. They were both teachers and taught English in one of the many emerging Foreign language schools in Yamate, an area popular with expats. My great Grandfather was apparently very forward thinking for his time. He was passionate about education, especially education for women.

In the 1930’s as tensions grew between Japan and China, and whispers of the Second World War started to appear, my great grandparents realised they had to leave. They packed up the life they loved in Japan and took the steamship via the Suez Canal back to Southampton with Mona and her brother Billy in tow who tragically died a few years later in the war. His plane was shot down and his body never found. The grief clung to Mona like a dark mist.

She told me she struggled adjusting to life in the UK. She found the food, climate and culture strange. She had always been shy and didn’t make friends easily. Like me, she said she was bullied at school and never felt confident as a young woman. Like me in my younger days she had questionable taste in men. I dont know for sure, but I feel that she saw the sweetness in everyone and either was obviously to, or more likely ignored the red flags. She met my Granddad Peter in her twenties and was swept away by his charismatic ways. Unfortunately he was never a stable or reliable partner. He had multiple affairs and was hardly at home, choosing instead to spend his time pursuing his own interests, travelling and meeting who he considered were influential people which of course is great if there are no children and family to support. Peter and Mona divorced when my Mum and her sister Rose were young teenagers.

In the 1950’s/early 1960’s divorce was not common. Interestingly my Dad’s parents also got divorced when he was six.

Both my parents came from unstable homes with unreliable parents. They broke the cycle, fully and completely and raised my brother and I with love, stability and devotion. They still live in my childhood home. They’re still very much together. I never had to change schools. We never moved house. My Mum in comparison was always moving house and went to at least 7 different schools. I’m eternally grateful to them for providing such a warm and loving home. Even though we had our challenges, I always felt loved. I always knew that whatever happened, even when I behaved really badly, even when I’d messed everything up I’d have a place to go. I knew they would never disown me. It breaks my heart that this isn’t always the case.

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For so many years I didn’t really think about Mona being born in Japan. I didn’t consider it as particularly unusual or even interesting. It was only a few years ago, after she died when I found a transcript of an interview my brother and my Dad did with her that it really dawned on me. My other Grandma Rachael was also born overseas, in Argentina to British parents during the Spanish Civil War. Strong women are in my blood. Strong women are behind all of us. I’ve never been to Japan but I feel drawn to visit. I would love to explore Yokohama and walk the same streets Mona did some 100 years ago.

Mona died in 2015. I’d been living in Australia for a few years but happened to be visiting in the weeks before she took her final breath. I was reading to her and watching her crepe paper skin rustle against her bones. My warm robust hand was holding hers. She loved to read but eventually even that became too much effort. She was barely speaking. Barely breathing. As I finished the chapter and turned off the light I spoke softly in her ear ‘Mona, I’m going to Amsterdam for a few days but I’ll be back soon. I’ll see you then’.

She opened her eyes for the first time in a while and said clearly and simply. ’No, you won’t’.

The next day as I arrived in my hostel my Mum called me on Skype. Mona’s died, she said.

I’ve been thinking about Mona a lot recently. I’ve been thinking about my ancestors, these women, many of them who I’ve never met who shaped me. Their DNA created mine. A dizzyingly obvious yet constantly astounding truth is we all existed inside the womb of a woman. We were all carried for a time in this way. Every single one of us. Remembering that can bring a moment of clarity. This person in front of me at the post office existed inside a woman. This person driving very close behind me existed inside a woman. If that isn’t a miracle, then nothing is a miracle.

May we celebrate the women in our life. May we take time to learn and record the stories of our elders. May we appreciate in every moment the gift of this life.

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If the earth is a woman

If the sea is a woman

If the moon is a woman

I know God is a woman

To our daughters

To our sisters

To our mothers

You're stronger than you know

Lubiana

The psyches and souls of women also have their own cycles and seasons of doing and solitude, running and staying, being involved and being removed, questing and resting, creating and incubating, being of the world and returning to the soul-place.

—Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Women Who Run With the Wolves

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