This true story is beginning to recede in memory. This really happened to me. When we moved here, the only place we could find to live was a beach house. A beach house rented in the off season can be a bargain, except that beach houses are built for the warm weather, and we live in New England.
So we lived in the beach house for a short season and in the morning the living room had the bright blue ocean and at night, the moon would shine over the water. It was the kind of place that you want to see on vacation. The beauty had a quality of being out of place. Our life, at the time was very chaotic. We had moved our five (then) children here from San Diego. The rhythm of our life was exhausting to everyone because we had enrolled them in a parochial school and there was a clash going on.
At the time, I also found out I was expecting our youngest. So there we were, down a country road in a beach house. It was too small for us, and the weather was too strange. When the sun went down the house froze. My mother came out to live with us because it was just all too different after years and years in sunny California.
Yet, the ocean and the sunrise and the moon, and the herons and sea birds were so beautiful. There was a dock and a beach and a grand sweep of ocean. Like immigrants in the strange country we would sit, my children and husband, the Mayflower descendants, and my mother and me, stunned at the hardship of daily life in the cold.
Somehow we all muddled through that period. I thought I was miscarrying. I was sick with a lingering bronchitis. There was a dreadful storm that brought the ocean to the edge of the yard. In our optimistic fashion, we tried to make the most of it. Some parts, like the school, weren’t working. The kids needed to be brought back to home school, but that would not happen for another year or two.
On one of those days when I didn’t know what to do, I took a walk with my littlest boy (who is now fourteen). I took a walk down to the beach and what I saw took my breath away.
I had walked into a fairy tale. One the beach were twelve swans sunning themselves. I counted them, twelve. Just like my favorite fairy tale, “The Wild Swans”. Then I knew everything would work out. Of course it would. God knew that His child, Kathleen, would recognize His custom made sign. Just for me. For the child in me. Twelve swans. I will never forget the beautiful sight.
The twelve swans didn’t move. They were very relaxed on that beach. Everything got better for us. I got well. My baby grew in my womb, healthy and strong. We moved into our beloved old house. The baby was born. Everything got better.
Whenever the terrain gets bumpy, I think of the day of the twelve swans and know that everything will be alright.
