Leaves from an Unexpected Life: A Refugee’s Journey

December 16, 2019

 

Leaves from an Unexpected Life: A Refugee’s Journey

My mother Marta is an accomplished artist, she has had a great many shows at galleries and continues at the age of 89 to create beautiful works that are in high demand whenever she has a showing of her work. For the past year or so she has been keeping busy with a new creative outlet, writing. Her first book, a memoir of short vignettes from her remarkable life, “Leaves from an Unexpected Life: A Refugee’s Journey” was just released this month and she had an event scheduled in her home of Winston-Salem to celebrate the release.

Marta

Then the truly unexpected happened and Marta suffered heart failure just before the party was scheduled, and on top of that while recovering in Wake Forest Babtist Hospital, she had an additional complication when she had a fairly serious stroke. Kathy and I got one of those messages that you never want to get that Marta was hospitalized and had a long, long road to recovery ahead.

Brian and Michael 

As soon as was possible I was in the car and driving from Key West to Winston-Salem, where my sisters Michele and Marika and her husband Brian were already on hand to look after Marta. Kathy was already scheduled to fly up for the book release party, so we just left her reservation in place. While it was clear that Marta was in no condition to attend the party, we decided to move forward in hosting it because it would have been devastating to Marta for us to do otherwise. 

 

John and Gayle

 

 

After her additional hospital stay, Marta was transferred to the Strict Center for Aging to begin in earnest her rehabilitation and recovery, yet she was still not able to leave to attend the party, having to readjust to the new reality that her health issues present. It was determined that we could do a facetime live connection to Marta from the rehab center, so that she could see all her wonderful friends who had gathered and that they could see that she was stable and happy to be able to participate, even though she was incredibly disappointed to not be there in person.

The event was a huge success, with much thanks to my sister Marika and Brian, who organized and hosted the event, even though Marika opted to stay with Marta at the center and missed the party herself. It was so gratifying to see and meet so many of Marta’s wonderful friends in Winston-Salem, she really has created her own community of friends and fans during the thirteen years she has lived there and that gave us all great comfort during what was otherwise a difficult and challenging time.

 

There were some long, tough days staying with Marta as she began the process of rehabilitation and recovery. Special thanks to her best friend Marni, who flew in from Indianapolis and spent days with Marta in the rehab facility, allowing time for the rest of us to take a break and prepare the next step of her journey, a more long term facility where Marta was moved after about 10 days at the Sticht Center, Brookdale Reynolda Road.

I am happy to report that she is making some progress, it has certainly been slow and she desperately wants to get back to the total independence that she had before these setbacks, but she is a fighter and is working hard to get back to her beloved Condo as soon as possible. Thanks so much to everyone who has contacted us and offered their support, prayers and good wishes. My mother Marta is a much beloved, larger than life character and it is gratifying to see how much she means to such a wide variety of people.

Kathy and I spent many hours with Marta, she was interested in signing copies of her book, both for the party and for future planned events. We are still hopeful that she will be able to travel at some point to Key West where Kathy and I want to host a book release party. In the meantime, we will just keep working towards her recovery.

 

While in Winston, Kathy and I did manage to get out a bit, especially in the evenings. We visited Old Salem, which is a historic Moravian community just a couple of blocks from Marta’s home. The small community features restored original buildings from the community that was founded in 1753. A National Historic Landmark, Old Salem showcases the culture of the Moravian settlement in North Carolina during the 18th and 19th centuries, communal buildings, churches, houses, and shops

While in Winston, I also managed to take in a local high school basketball game, and visit Congaree National Park, which is a short drive south in South Carolina. Congaree is one of my favorite stops when visiting the area as it is home to one of the last remaining old growth forests left in the United States. With 15,000 acres of designated wilderness, the Congaree is home to some of the tallest trees in the Eastern United States and has one of the highest temperate deciduous forest canopies remaining in the world.

 

The landscape constantly changes and I had never visited during December, though under water much of the year, as it is known as a swamp even though it is in actuality an old growth bottomland hardwood forest that is inundated and partially submerged during portions of the year. It was pretty dry during this visit, allowing me the opportunity to walk the beautiful boardwalk in almost complete solitude, something that was soothing and helpful after a pretty stressful time.

 

 

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