June 13th, 2025: Celebrating a 50 Year Anniversary

Jim, Brook (our 1st golden retriever), and myself in our first little apartment in Gresham, Oregon

On the road heading west to destination unknown

Our last days with old friends before departing Michigan

For many years we had the map of the United States hanging on our wall which traced our journey westward.

Many old friends from Michigan came to visit us, and some stayed for 1-2 years, but Jim and I were the only ones who made the Pacific Northwest our permanent home.

Celebrating a 50 Year Anniversary

In the weeks leading up to our journey West, I would squint my eyes at looming cumulus clouds that were so prevalent in Michigan and imagine the clouds to be mountains. I yearned to live somewhere near mountains...

Sitting in our last Michigan home in the late spring of 1975, Jim and I would talk about different places we might want to settle. Would it be Colorado, or Idaho, or Montana, or Utah, or...? We didn't know anyone who we would seek to live near. We had no jobs. The only thing that we knew was to head West.

Then on Friday, June 13th, 1975 my first husband and our golden Brook and I departed the home of my childhood and ancestors. The night before I cried hard. I was scared. I did not know where we would end up. And I did not know if I would ever see my twin brother again. We were heading into a complete unknown. But the pull to leave was stronger than my fear. 

Gratefully, and shortly before our journey began, Jim's parents generously gifted us with the small popup trailer that he and his sisters had grown up camping in. This was to be our "covered wagon." And for weeks Jim and our 11 month old golden retriever and I traveled to different states where we'd once thought maybe we'd want to live there. Only it is extremely difficult to think of someplace as "home" when driving through a foreign town or city. So we just kept going. And going.

Back in Michigan, we hadn't considered Oregon or Washington someplace where we'd want to land. It rained too much, we told ourselves. But then our money was nearly gone when we were in Seattle. So we briefly but unsuccessfully searched for a home there. And Jim said, "Let's go to Portland." By that time, I was so tired of camping and being on the road, but I agreed to heading south into Oregon.

As Jim and I passed through Portland and headed east on July 12th, I wept at first sight of the Columbia River Gorge. OH! It was so beautiful! Along the way there were spectacular waterfalls with names I did not know how to pronounce. And there was Mt. Hood and Mount St. Helens and other mountains I did not know. And the mighty Columbia River and endless forests and Wild Places. I was blown away with all of the extraordinary beauty.

We camped three nights out in the gorge while we searched for our first home. Once we landed the little apartment in Gresham, I drove the next day to Sandy, Oregon, which was a few miles east, to apply for my first job. And the tiny tavern, then called Ron's No Place and now called the No Place Saloon, hired me on the spot. The apartment managers also hired Jim — and ultimately also our old Michigan friend, Ron Zilli, who ended up living with us for our first year — to paint the apartment complex. And that was our beginning.

Jim and myself with Dillon and our 3 sons, 1990.

There was much that I did not imagine would unfold over time. My dad died suddenly that November of 1975. He was the one who I never saw again. And my twin, who suffered from deep untreated generational trauma, ended his life just over two years later. Although my mother's mental illness made me incredibly scared to become a mother, Jim and I went on to give birth to our sons Brian and Kevin in 1979 and 1982. Jim got sober in 1983 and I followed in 1984. Then we had Matthew, our "sobriety baby," in 1987. I cherished our beautiful children. And, gradually, over many years, everything changed. 

Ultimately Jim and I divorced in 2002. And in 2010 I met my beloved Ron. I also continued to be rooted into a path of awakening and unburdening and transforming ancestral and cultural trauma. As my journey unfolded, I became a wounded healer and engaged in work in different capacities with children and families for 30 years. Then came the extraordinary miracle with my mother who experienced a partial awakening at age 87 and a channel into her heart opened for the first time. We were able to experience a closeness over the last seven years of her life that had not been possible before. And over all these years, rich and enduring friendships evolved and grew, as did our beloved family. And today there are six grandchildren who we adore and love being Grandpa Ron and Grammie Molly to. So many gifts. So many...

And through it all, the Wild Places — the mountains, Mother Ocean, the gorge, the endless forests and wilderness, the high desert and fossil bed areas, the rivers and lakes and waterfalls, all this and more — were my sanctuaries, our family's cathedrals, our grounding for healing and nourishment through hard times and times of great blessing.

This was the last picture taken with my brother, June 1975, just before leaving Michigan

Although I did not realize it at the time, I know today that there was a strong spiritual pull to embark on the sacred journey that brought me home to the Pacific Northwest, the home to my soul. The aspect that I did not grasp 50 years ago was that I was choosing to save myself. I knew in some deep place within me that my birth family was going down and that I had to choose to get off the suicide ship my parents and brother were on. I needed to get 2,500 miles between us. And for years I struggled with survivor's guilt. But not today.

I weep in this moment with this profound gratitude for my journey, a journey that began 50 years ago when Jim and I courageously headed into the unknown. That physical journey was followed by a journey of the heart and soul which has evolved beyond my wildest dreams. I have found not just the outward peace and beauty that I yearned for here in the Pacific Northwest, but also the deepening into the beauty and peace and strength of my own heart and soul that I now also recognize as something sacred within us all.

Life can be so hard. Being human is not easy! And it can take so much courage and Grace to embark on the journeys that beckon us all and in so many different forms and ways. For much of my young life, I felt so alone and was overwhelmed by shame and fear and addictions and an ocean of grief that I tried so hard to numb and deny. And then doorway after doorway appeared and I entered. Again and again and again. I bow in the deepest gratitude. And my ancestors smile...

May we all find our pathways, our journeys of the heart and soul into our deeper wholeness and the sacred beauty of who we truly are. This, in its essence, is what I believe Life asks of us. At least this had certainly been true for me. There are many doorways. May we continue to seek them and enter. Again and again and again.

With deep gratitude and heartfelt blessings,

Molly

With Ron and Shira, June 2025

Mt. Hood, Photo by Molly