Yiayia's Journey Part 25

On a December night in 2002, my Yiayia ~ the ever evolving, marvelous matriarch Penelope Conomos ~ savored a rare, full circle moment. With her youngest grandchild Alexa home for the holidays, the entire family reunited to plan the journey of a lifetime - a family trip to Yiayia's beloved homeland of Greece.

Their tour guide would be the always animated Anastasia--Yiayia's second daughter. For ever zealous about their heritage, she'd often visited those shores to trace and to preserve their family lineage. And with each visit, she developed a lifelong passion for the homeland and legacy that Yiayia had left behind so long ago.

But later that very night, the phone rang with terrible news. No less than an hour after the family parted, Anastasia suddenly collapsed and was rushed to the hospital. After conducting a battery of tests, the results were devastating. Seemingly overnight, Anastasia had developed stage 4 cancer. And she was now in the fight for her life.

But the cancer would not relent. And as her health deteriorated, Anastasia would ask Yiayia for one final gift: to visit their homeland one last time together. So at the age of 95, the still vigorous former peasant girl who'd once only ever travelled by donkey, then by boat and then by train, would now board a plane to grant her daughter's dying wish.

Upon arriving at the familiar shores of Kythera with my father and other relatives, Yiayia would lead Anastasia on final jaunts through time: To that lonely stone cottage overlooking the sea where Yiayia had miraculously been born. The platia where Papou had first glimpsed the beautiful, laughing Yiayia riding her donkey side saddle to market. And to the family cemetery - the eternal home of Yiayia s beloved mother and relatives. It was also where Yiayia's trademark feisty nature reared its wonderful head again.

For per Greek tradition, relatives were buried together. One by one they'd re-open the slab and add another family member to the club. So upon reading the names on that family grave, she'd say, "My beloved Mother!" Cue wailing. "My sweet cousin!" More crying. "Oh look, there's so and so". More weeping. And then finally, an abrupt: "And there's--. Wait, what the--? What the hell is SHE doing in there??" (We were later informed that she was a distant cousin who Yiayia thought was "loose" with the village men.)

Indeed, amid such sadness, Yiayia's inner fire provided her much needed strength. For no one truly comprehended just how much grit she'd have to muster to revisit the memories of her past. Each jaunt was a painful reminder of just how much she'd had to adapt and to endure over the years. And that very soon, she would have to do so yet again.

So upon returning to American soil beside her precious Anastasia, the usually ever gracious, always wise Yiayia became angry. And so having fulfilled Anastasia's last wish ~ my Yiayia made this solemn vow: that she would never return to the shores of her beloved homeland of Greece again. Never. Such is the life.