Bahama Mamas
Kate and I walked through the casino of the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas, past a few hotel gift shops and towards a little market that sold snacks and all those miscellaneous items travelers might have forgotten at home.
“Should we write a poetry book together?” I asked her.
Kate smiled, and her eyes said yes.
So right there in between a wall of chips and a refrigerator of sodas, we decided to write a collection of poetry together, which is absolutely wild seeing that we didn’t know each other just 2 days prior.
My family and I decided to take a winter vacation to the Atlantis, after I found a somewhat secret deal that allows US military members to get a free five night stay at the resort. It was the first time out of the country for Gabriel, which is something I was pretty excited about, given my pure love for travel and seeing the world, now with him by my side. On a trip that was supposed to be a relaxing January break from the cold turned into a lifelong journey with a mom from Cananda who somehow found me right where I was at.
Pool hopping was our main activity on the trip. It was only a matter of time before Gabriel, being the social butterfly that he is, struck up a conversation with another boy his age at the Mayam Temple pool. Which led to me striking up a conversation with his mom, which led to this beautiful journey between two writers who were meant to meet.
Sometimes you just meet people in this lifetime where things make sense. And in that moment, meeting Kate made sense. Both of us moms to boys the same age, both of us writers and aspiring movie makers, both of us poets, both of us with big dreams that wildly felt so familiar to each other.
After meeting at the pool, we had an impromptu mom’s night out at the Dilly Club in Marina Village. Over a couple of drinks, we shared about our lives back home, mine in the States, hers in Canada. We spoke about our dreams as writers and everything she said resonated to me on an artistic level that I had never felt with another person before. Writing had always been such a solo journey for me, and now all of a sudden, it wasn’t anymore.
Travel can do magical things like that. Chance meetings start to feel somehow planned by the Universe, that a couple of moms from across different countries were supposed to meet to share their stories. I felt it, and I know Kate felt it too.
Fast forward just a few months later, and here it is. Our collection of poetry, entitled the Truth was all we told.
It’s a little bit of a lot of things: motherhood, family, grief, and love. And it’s a lot about one major thing: the intricate ways the universe works to bring us right where we belong.
