Guest Column- JEWEL OF A MEMORY

By Carol Rhodes
Nothing of importance must have happened on the tiny island of Nassau before 1961 when I visited it for the first time, since none of my early geography books acknowledged its existence and it’s an almost certain fact none of my teachers had ever been there. At least, if they had, they never mentioned it. So, it was only years later thai i would learn about Nassau, the capital city of the Bahama Islands. Once a British colony and only a hundred miles off the Florida coast, its pristine beaches and turquoise waters made it popular with tourists and honeymooners. However, my story really begins when the man
whom I had been dating, an avid sailor and a much-indemand navigator, made his usual winter trip to Florida to participate in the Southern Ocean Circuit sailboat races: St Petersburg to Havana, the Lipton Cup, held in the gulf stream off Miami, Miami to Nassau, and the Nassau Cup, the windwardBleeward race off Nassau. After the races, he had plans to stay in Nassau for a
few days to discuss a company iicensing agreement with some businessmen from England.
The afternoon before their scheduled arrival, he telephoned me from the island and asked if I would pick up some completed contracts from his attorney’s office. I was totally taken by surprise when he added, Say, I have a great idea. Instead of mailing the papers, why don’t ,you just bring them over and stay for a couple of days? Thrilled at the prospect of leaving the cold and
rain behind in Houston, I jumped at the chance. In the 1960’s, air travel from Houston to Nassau involved an overnight stop in Miami. After several restless hours in a motel near the airport, I was up at the crack of dawn the next day for the hour-long flight to the island. As the land beneath the plane slipped away, from my window seat I watched the sun-drenched water turn from grey along the shore to turquoise and azure in a matter of minutes. Driving a sporty little convertible, he met me at the
airport. On the way into town, we stopped on a bluff overlooking a deserted stretch of beach. There we kissed for a very long time before running barefoot across the scorching sand and wading into the crystal cool water. Never mind that i was wearing a new linen dress.
Hawkers selling straw hats and bags, shell necklaces, and figurines carved from ironwood ran after our car as we drove to the other side of the island to Buen Retiro, a guest house owned by an elderly couple. The house was pink and whitewash, with verandas encircling it on both floors. It was here in the garden surrounded by brilliant bougainvillea, hibiscus, and palm
trees we drank tea in the afternoon and later sipped cocktails while watching the sun’s last rays fade into night.
In this Shangri-la, I tasted my first lobster and was introduced to such tropical delicacies as coconut breaded shrimp, planter’s punch, a delicious but potent mixture of rum and fruit juice, conch salad, conch fritters, and conch chowder. The Islanders claim conch is an aphrodisiac. I tried hard to prove them wrong. We strolled the beaches, swam when we wanted, collected shells, wrote our names in the sand and watched the tide wash them away, then roasted marshmallows over an open fire fed by scraps of driftwood. We admired yachts in the harbor, made friends with local fishermen, bought cashmere sweaters for a
fraction of their state-side cost, and in a seamy back alley cafe persuaded Captain Joe Miron to sell us one of his famous watercolors. We drank strong coffee and ate wheat toast, served on blue flower rimmed china plates, in the cool of the morning on the veranda outside our room, and fell more deeply in love than either of us had ever imagined was possible.
Both of us had been previously married at a very young age, when goals, ideals, and individual qualities needed to ensure a lasting marriage were mostly overshadowed by hormones. After having been divorced for awhile, I am pleased to say each of us had developed a more mature approach to the responsibilities of marriage. Later I remember thinking everyone should have the opportunity to really get to know their prospective partner for life in a setting free of social and family pressures, where your past, your present, and your future are sealed by long walks on the beach under the blistering sun of day and a star-filled sky of night. What began as a trip just for fun ended in a long term commitment of love, marriage, children, sickness, health, laughter, tears. You may be wondering if my husband and I ever go back to this island paradise. We
have, many times, and always stay with the Carey’s in their pink and whitewash guesthouse. Somehow, though, none of our other visits has ever measured up in terms of the thrill and excitement of the very first one-the one which gave us the crowning jewel in our collection of memories.