When I was a child my family took a road trip east, driving through New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. While in Maine, my parents craved fresh seafood but the restaurants were a bit pricey for a family of four. We pulled over on a coastal road and got out to stretch, and my mom did something I’ll never forget.
She waded into the water and returned with her shirt wet, outstretched like a basket, holding at least a dozen oysters and mussels. We went into our little 1986 Ford Mallard C-Class RV and she proceeded to clean and shuck the oysters, then turned on the oven and baked oysters rockefeller right there on the side of the road. I was astounded by her resourcefulness, the indigenous skillfulness and ingenuity that allowed us to eat directly from the Earth; a mother providing for a mother, the daughter of a Filipino fisherman.
As I was traipsing along the beaches of Malibu this month, squatting down to examine the little ecosystems in the tide pools, watching the sea anemones open and close, the bright blue mussels clinging to every square inch of the rocks- I was reminded of my mother, the way she sought sustenance from the creatures of the ocean, and I couldn’t help but think of how I am innately drawn to water. So it wasn’t by chance that my mom called me while I was out there poking around, and I felt cradled, nurtured by these two sources of life.
