“Pity you left it unsaid”

Peter shook his head for emphasis as we left my sister’s house. My patience had been tested, and I didn’t need my husband to point to the obvious. After yet another family meeting to address the inheritance, we weren’t closer to a resolution.

Alicia, Pablo, Diego, and I, the four Lacruza siblings, had been gifted  Meadow Lark Ranch. The house, its surrounding grazing meadows, a mountain creek running through, acres of woods, in addition to three hundred heads of Hereford cattle, a remuda of fine horses, paddocks, gardens, beehives, outbuildings, and farm equipment. Cora, our matriarch, had held everything and everyone together since our father died. We had mourned him, but things kept running. Mother wouldn’t let things go unattended, unchecked, unkempt, or unraveling. But now that she was gone, cracks were showing. We, siblings, expressed divergent needs and hopes for the ancestral land: Alicia cautiously, Pablo rationally, Diego passionately, and I, willing as ever to be flexible for the sake of peace.

Cora had aged slowly, her luscious dark hair only lately turning white, the spring in her steps impaired by a fall just the prior winter. She had carried a powerful and charismatic presence to the end. So why hadn’t Mother crowned an heir? With plenty of time and sound counsel to secure a legacy, why hadn’t she settled her affairs? 

Since her death, we have questioned every possible motivation and reviewed our kin history. We shook the family tree, hoping fruit would fall and answer our queries:  Remember the stories about Great Granddad, whose father was born in Mexico and was the family-proclaimed bandito? And Grandma Lina, a great beauty who had been unfaithful? And more recently, Uncle Jim, killed in Vietnam, who never wanted to be a rancher but dreamt of the open sea? And Aunt Dolores, who didn’t marry that gentle fiancé and, instead of children, nursed every injured winged or hoofed creature on the land? All gone now. As she planned for the future, our mother would have considered the high cost of family trauma to the past generations who had accumulated land, cattle and wealth. 

We concluded that she couldn’t imagine Meadow Lark Ranch other than it had always been in her capable hands- a vibrant, thriving hub of labor, calluses, sweat, and splendid, undivided beauty. Cora had left no cues, only a solemn demand that we wouldn’t sell to an outsider but find a way to share the stewardship and duties of her gift-  a gift that binds – 

She envisioned an aprés-moi-le-déluge and blood-is-thicker-than-water wrapped in one neat offering we could not refuse. This was an unreasonable and unworkable demand, and I was frustrated.

So when Alicia questioned how we would honor our mother’s wishes again, I ran out of the house before I could scream. In fleeing, I left unsaid that the Lacruza children would fall short of Cora’s expectations. They would split and disperse, leaving Meadow Lark Ranch in new hands to write a different story.

Photo by Helena Lopes: https://www.pexels.com/photo/herd-of-cattle-in-daytime-841303/