Red Light

The Wallkill River in Ogdensburg, New Jersey

The emotion surprised me. I sat at the intersection of Country Road 517 and State Road 23. Sussex County, New Jersey. A right hand turn would take me toward the town of Sussex, where my mother’s parents once lived in a house surrounded by the rolling hills and farmland of northwest New Jersey. There use to be more cows in this part f New Jersey than people. At least I was told that when I was growing up and spent summers with both sets of grandparents.

To the left, was Ogdensburg, my father’s hometown. My intentions were to visit my father’s youngest brother, Ralph and his wife Eileen. They live in the same house where my paternal grandparents lived, the place where my father was a boy, a teen and a man. As I waited for the light to turn, a memory caught my heart.

There is nothing rational about grief. For a moment, I wanted to tell my grandparents, my mother’s parents, that my mom had died. Of course, neither of her parents is alive and in my heart I know they know their daughter has passed away. Yet, I wanted to tell them. I wanted to go to their graveside and let them know that their daughter was missing from my life. I also wanted to tell them what a good mom she had been. What a good wife she was too.

Green light. I turned the RV toward Ogdensburg and choked back the emotion. The farmlands would wait. I was headed toward the mining town, home of Sterling Hills Zinc Mine.