Candies from America

Written by Dawn Ortiz-Legg | 30 April 2009

In May of 2008 I had the opportunity to visit Belfast, Northern Ireland.  The Conflict Management class I was taking at the Bologna Center at Johns Hopkins University in Italy had organized an informational trip.  The purpose was to understand about “the troubles” 1962-1998.  These were the final years of the 800 year long conflict between the Catholic nationalists or republicans and the British state supported by the side referred to as Protestants, Unionists or Loyalists – as in Loyal to the Crown.   We learned first hand how it was “settled” in 1998 with a power sharing arrangement referred to as the Good Friday agreement.

But Belfast for me was not just about the conflict management trip.  It was very personal because one of those Loyalist Protestant women was my Mother’s pen pal for over 50 years.   Her name is Lenore Blean and she was probably the biggest reason I went to visit Belfast.

To vividly detail Lenore and our time together reminds me of a Rosamund Pilchner novel.   But where should I start?  How about the beginning?

It was 1949 when my 10 year-old Mother submitted her name to a children’s magazine searching for a pen pal in a far away place.  Lenore’s older cousin had shown her the magazine and told her “if you get a pen pal from America, she will send you candy”.  Well, in post-war Europe this would have been like a dream come true.  So an excited 10 year old Lenore went straight to work and wrote my Mother. 

It must have been so exciting for my Mom to receive a letter stamped with beautiful post marks from Northern Ireland.  Mom lived in a tiny town in rural Illinois, bounded by corn fields.  It had a population of 600 or so inhabitants.  But Mother wasn’t sheltered because her parents had come from the city of Chicago.  They had chosen Leland to raise their family and for my grandfather to start his Optometric practice there.   Things were not so rough for my Mom’s family at that time.  So when Lenore boldly dropped a hint about hoping for candies from America in her letter, Mom was able to send a very specially wrapped box containing exactly that.

This was the beginning of their very special relationship that lasted through marriages, children, special meetings, career changes, strokes, losses and all too soon, my Mother’s death in 2006.

When I arrived at the Belfast Airport, there was Lenore, now 68 years old, waiting with her redheaded grandson, Harry.  Harry was holding a little sign that read “Dawn?”  I immediately fell in love with little Harry and with Lenore’s gentle lilting voice and sweet face.  She immediately told me about the candies story and remarked, “I don’t know what I did yesterday Dawn, but I will never forget the taste of those candies”. 

It was like a dream staying with Lenore. Her warm house filled with good smells was as inviting as the pretty blue and white guest room where I slept. Lenore would wake me up for a hearty Irish breakfast cooked on her beautiful enamel Aga stove and then manage to get me to Belfast every morning for my meetings. When I returned at the end of the day, we would have a glass of wine while I shared what I learned about her country.  Often, she was as surprised as I was about many things.

It was on Sunday when I finally got to spend the entire day with Lenore.  She had said she wanted to drive north so I could see the emerald hills cut along the jagged coastline.  It was beautiful.  It was like a movie and like every book you read about the velvet green hills of Ireland.  Lenore had packed a picnic for us: Little sandwiches, a thermos of tea and of course, biscuits.

We drove over two hours, winding up and down and around country roads.  During that time, Lenore listened intently as I explained in great detail my Mother’s last weeks and how I was fortunate enough to be there for her very last breath.  It meant so much to be able to share with Lenore this life-changing episode for our family.

After awhile we parked by an empty pasture, climbed over the fence and found the perfect place to sit.  We found ourselves perched high over the blue ocean. As we devoured our delicious little picnic, we began to share secrets about our families. The missing pieces of my Mother’s life, my own heartbreaks, and the unfulfilled lives of those we loved, including our own.   We ended the day visiting Lenore’s relatives and sharing a delicious dinner out.  It was a day that I will never ever forget.

I had met Lenore once before, when I was barely five years old.  She had come to our town in Illinois to visit my Mother and Father. Lenore was an Optometrist, as was my father and my maternal grandfather.  It turned out that after all the years of writing, Mom had never shared this and when they found it, it solidified their connection.

That connection lasted for over a half of century, because my parents would go to Optometry conventions in Ireland and spend the time with Lenore and her husband Fred.  Now, Fred is in a nursing home, struck down by a debilitating stroke.  My Mom is gone.  But Lenore and I are writing a new chapter in a history that started with candies from America.