Only the Determined
by
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The scenery began to open up as she left Windsor behind, and the air became lighter. She could see the morning mist rising in the many vineyards surrounding her in the Russian River valley. Vineyards gave way to sheep pastures, which in turn were replaced by pear orchards at Ukiah. Then the flat and fertile fields fell away to the hills covered by wild oats and oak trees on the approach to Willits. It was lunchtime, but she wasn’t terribly hungry. The gnawing in the pit of her stomach that began last night was only getting worse, and it was not related to hunger. There is no use, she thought. I have to go. She chewed on the apple she brought as she waited at the light at Highway 20 to begin the dreaded trip through the Coastal Range to the sea beyond them. To the people living on the coast, this was called the Willits road. Sometimes she heard when growing up about folks wanting to live on the ocean who changed their mind when they realized that this was the fastest, and for most purposes the only, way back to civilization. It was a villainous road that dove and lunged for thirty-three miles as if to keep people away, as if to say, you must not come here. Only the determined would live in a place like this, she thought. The oak trees gave way to redwoods after the first mountain pass, and the sun flickered through them as she drove on. It felt eerie to be driving back, like a lifetime away, revealed by peeling back layers of time. Only it wasn’t a lifetime; it had only been four years. She felt numb, but not numb enough for the pain to go away. This commission is bad enough without having to go home on top of it, she thought. That was the last thing I wanted to do. It wasn’t Aunt Audrey. She was great, she always had been. Cecily felt guilty that she hadn’t been back to visit her. Aunt Audrey wasn’t about to move from her home of forty years, and Cecily was not interested in returning, so the stalemate went on. Cecily did write fairly often, though that got harder to keep up as she got busier with her artwork. Then there was the scenery. It wasn’t merely pretty or impressive; for Cecily, there simply wasn’t anyplace like it anywhere. She remembered how she used to feel when she was a little girl, wanting to paint the splendor around her, drawing comfort from silently speaking to the world through her brush about the visions surrounding her. She remembered how the evening sun would fill the land and sea with so much light her eyes would hurt from the intensity. Then there were the times her aunt asked her to pick blackberries on the headlands. She could still see the village cottages clustered like pastured sheep against the bracing Pacific winds, while the waves pounded the rocky fortress walls of the cliffs she walked upon, and a reluctant sun descended in a dance of diamond fire on the whitecapped sea below. Mendocino. It will be a relief, she thought, to be back in a place where a scene begged to be painted at every turn. A place I know well. At least that part of this trip will work out. The road at long last straightened out and she snapped out of her reverie. The ocean opened up before her as she proceeded to Highway 1, and she began watching the coastline go by. The last scene as she turned off onto Lansing Street was of the rocky coast receding to the point, awash with waves that made a white border to the deep blue sea surrounding it. This might not be so bad, she thought. She made her way to Albion Street and turned off onto the narrow road her aunt lived on. She was almost there when she saw a young girl with long black hair walking her still younger brother home from school. Cecily found herself fighting back tears. I will never know what happened to Allison, she thought. The world has swallowed him up and swept him away from me.
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About the Book
A troubled young artist is forced to return home to the Northern California coast to tackle a daunting commission. To do so, she must confront her own feelings of inadequacy and the memories of her terrible past. With the difficult commission hanging over her, she must come to grips with her family’s heritage, but not before learning that real accomplishment is only for the determined.
About the Author
J. Clifford Barnes is a program coordinator (and sometime technical writer) for the State of California’s Office of Emergency Services. He grew up in the San Francisco Bay area and has lived in Hawaii and the North Coast of California. He presently resides near Sacramento, where he continues to assist his artist wife Susan in her art business. A published poet and news reporter, Only the Determined is his first novel of any length.