Cynthia Cluff

When my parents were newly married my father joined the Navy and was sent to Oak Harbor, Washington to serve on Whidbey Island. That is where I was born. My father's sister and her husband were also newly married. My uncle was in the Army and they were also sent to Washington. That is where my cousin was born, just 25 days before me.

Cynthia and I were fast friends. Our mothers dressed us alike and for our entire lives we always had a lot in common. After the service my father took our family home to California. Cynthia went with her parents to Arizona. She and her brother would come at least once a year to visit. As we got older and able to read and write we became pen pals, writing to each other of experiences we shared in our young lives.

Cynthia was 10 when tragedy struck and her mother died. Cynthia's life would be altered forever. Aunt Peggy was a happy person. She loved her husband and children. She enjoyed being a wife, mother and homemaker. She sewed, cooked and always had a smile on her face. Her life was cut short by breast cancer.

Uncle Milford quickly married again to a young widow with two children. It was not a marriage of love, but of necessity and companionship for two young widows with a need--hers for support and care--his for two young motherless children. The family continued to grow--5 more children were added to the union. In this large family Isabel ruled with order and firmness. Each child had a responsibility--Cynthia became quite the seamstress, making clothes for the entire family. Other daughters did the cooking and cleaning--each had a specific assignment. The three boys kept up the mini farm with their father. If it was not a home of love it was certainly a house of order.

Cynthia and I kept in touch. Her visits to California were more seldom, but we still wrote letters. We were both married quite young at the age of 18, me in March, Cynthia in May. Our first babies were born a year later, hers in May, mine in July. Our next three children all came along in quick succession totaling four children each, all under 4 years old. Cynthia and I loved to get together and discuss our crazy lives--being newly wed (5 years) and having 4 children was quite the challenge--it was good to have a friend who understood what I was living.

As the years progressed the lack of maternal attention started to show in Cynthia's life. Her postpartum depression increased after each baby. She had her fifth baby when my sixth was born. This time I don't think she ever recovered. When we would get together and visit I felt like she had the personality she inherited from her mother peeking out and it would clash with the training of her step mother. It was like she had two opposite personalities dwelling in the same person and she did not know how to let them live peacefully together. Our families were young and large. We were young--under 30 years old and married just over 10 years. As I read back over my journal entries of those years I am reminded of how difficult everyday living was.

Soon Cynthia could not handle it any longer and walked away from her husband and family. She walked away from her parents and siblings. She started pursuing an interest in acting and enjoyed community theater. She met and married Joe Sorensen, changed her name to Amber Dawn and started her life again in a quiet, solitary way. She kept minimal contact with our grandmother. For over 20 years I had very little knowledge of where she was and how she was dong. In the last five years I occasionally made an effort to find her but met dead ends or non returns on my efforts.

Last summer I decided to try again. I left a message on the answering machine, but unlike in times past, a few days later my call was returned. Amber and I talked every few weeks over the course of the next 9 months. We caught up on all of the lost years. She had reunited with her children one by one. She was a happy grandmother busy crocheting blankets for each of her grandchildren. She and Joe had made a happy life together. She, like her mother was dying of breast cancer.

We still had a lot in common. She told me she always thought of me as a sister. I must admit our bond was close and I too had those same feelings. I missed our companionship during those middle years as she floundered trying to figure out who she was--torn between the teachings of a step mother and the inborn creative personality of her natural mother.

I asked why she chose her new name and she answered it represented a bright new beginning. She was born Cynthia Cluff, daughter of Milford Cluff and Peggy Kidman. She married Stan Thompson in her youth and together they had 5 children: Jared, Tenay, Kendra, Tesha, and Ryan. She finished her life as Amber Dawn, married for 25 years to Joseph Sorensen. She was happy and content. She passed away April 28th after a 3 year battle with breast cancer.

Today Amber would have been 57 years old. Happy Birthday, Cynthia. I love you and pray you are finding peace in your mother's arms.