Pursuit of Paradise: Memoir of a Bahama Mama

By Georgene S. Dreishpoon

In l967, when Georgene Dreishpoon and her husband Irving read a National Geographic article about the Bahamas, a mental seed was planted that would sprout seven years later when they embarked on an unforgettable and magical ferry ride to the island of Green Turtle Cay in the Bahamas.

In her fascinating memoir, Pursuit of Paradise, Dreishpoon shares her experiences as a member of an American family who sought a fishing retreat in the Bahamas and, in the process, discovered lifelong friendships and ultimately faced the fact that even in paradise, the realities of life lurk in the background. For sixty days a year, the Dreishpoons left their life in America and lived on an island that captured their imaginations and their souls. Through entertaining anecdotes, Dreishpoon provides a glimpse into how her family immersed themselves in a new culture, learned to communicate with local inhabitants, and acquired a taste for new foodall while cherishing their time together as they experienced a new adventure.

Pursuit of Paradise chronicles nearly twenty-five years of amazing stories of one familys extraordinary experiences on a beautiful Bahamian island that affected their philosophy of living and loving forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Aug 16, 2010
• ISBN: 9781450247597

Georgene S. Dreishpoon

Georgene S. Dreishpoon was born in Poughkeepsie, New York. Her essays have appeared in Medical Economics, Trout, THE FLYFISHER, Hudson Valley Magazine, Doctors' Wives by Cynthia S. Smith, and The New York Times. She and her husband reside in Boynton Beach, Florida and summer in Dutchess County, New York.

Book preview

Pursuit

of

Paradise

Memoir of a Bahama Mama

Georgene S. Dreishpoon

iUniverse, Inc.

Bloomington

Pursuit of Paradise

Memoir of a Bahama Mama

Copyright © 2011 Georgene S. Dreishpoon

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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ISBN: 978-1-4502-4758-0 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-4502-4760-3 (cloth)

ISBN: 978-1-4502-4759-7 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 1/26/2011

Contents

Acknowledgments

Preface

Discovering Paradise

Innocence and Romance: 1975

Boating Allure: 1977

Sharing Our Space/Gathering Knowledge: 1978

Maturing to Island Life Acquaintances and Events: 1979

In Pursuit of the Menu: 1980

Don’t Judge the Book by the Cover

Island Challenges: 1981

Health Concerns

Forced to Face Some Realities: 1981

Seeking Legal Help: March 1981

The Mystery Man of Green Turtle Cay

A Disturbing Message from Our Island: September 1981

Auntie Lu and the Haitians: March 5, 1982

Forget Boating at Night

Paradise Compromised: January 2, 1983

My Birthday on GTC: January 4, 1983

A Small World Story

Zapped by the Island Current

What Police Protection?

Continued Apprehension: Wednesday, January 24, 1984

Insurance with a Story: January 26, 1984

The Sign of the Finger

Mixed Emotions: February 1984

Paradise? What Was Happening? January 24, 1985

Intruding Haitians on Green Turtle Cay: February 15, 1985

The Story of Little Lewis: March 1985

The Fateful Picnic: 1985

The House Is Sold: 1987

Rental Seduction: February 1988

Panic for Friends: A Political Agenda: February 22, 1989

Life Goes On: March 17, 1990

Island People Stories: 1991/1992

Continuing Revelations: 1993–1997

Sobering News: October 1997

No Paradise in Paradise: April 22–30, 1998

Afterword

About the Author

I am dedicating my book to Eileen and Earl Russell and their children: Steve, Colyn, Craig, Marsha, Randy, Sherry, and Lynn along with Steve’s wife, Bonnie; Colyn’s wife, Elena; Randy’s wife, Annabel, and Sherry’s husband, Zed. This Bahamian family enriched our Green Turtle Cay experience by giving us a window into their lives and their culture; they added a friendship that is still cherished. They characterized what family truly means. Eileen’s parents, Ma and Pa Pinder, established a family format. Eleven Bahamian generations shaped their world. My memoir could not have been written without their account.

Acknowledgments

Dr. Curtis Mendelson was the reason we chose Green Turtle Cay for our second home. He was brilliant, challenging, fun, frustrating, and embarrassing at times, but he was never dull. If we had the choice to live our lives over, we would choose the same path. It had many rewards.

Besides the Russell family, there were other Green Turtle villagers who contributed to this memoir in their own special way: Michael and Rita Levarity, Bill (Beardy) Elder and his wife Joan, the families named Sawyer, McIntosh, Lowe, Sands, Curry, Roberts, Bethel, and Saunders, plus others too numerous to mention.

I would like to thank Sandra Riley and Peggy C. Hall, whose unique knowledge of Green Turtle Cay and editorial assistance helped to bring this memoir to publication.

On the home front, hugs and kisses to my family and friends, who contributed and nourished me with love and humor throughout this project.

Georgene S. Dreishpoon

Preface

The aging process allows us to reflect and benefit from the insight that is gifted to us, providing that our minds are generous in spirit. My memoir stops in 1998; our relationship with our Bahamian friends did not stop. We are linked to the Russell family in many special ways. Randy and Annabel live near us in Florida, and they are often at our table, as we are at their table, sharing family events.

In March 2010, the seven Russell children, their spouses, grandchildren, extended family, and many friends suffered the loss of Eileen Russell, who died in a West Palm Beach Florida hospice facility. Daughter Marsha was glued to her mother throughout her illness; she was living with her in her hospice room day and night. Eileen had been there for Marsha at her time of need, and Marsha was there for her Mom on the other end of life, as were the other children and Eileen’s husband Earl in their own special way. Every day at her bedside, there was a gathering of people generating stories and often laughter.

A few days before Eileen died, we were with her in her hospice room, which had been made to look like a slice of the Bahamas. It had been filled with memories from home. Eileen was terminally ill, but she managed to get out of bed, sit on a small sofa to eat her lunch, and smile and converse with all of us.

Suddenly, a young woman with a guitar appeared at the door saying, I’m a volunteer, and I’ve come to play and sing a few songs for you. Is there a song that you would like?

Eileen said, Yes. Would you play ‘Amazing Grace’? With tears in our eyes, we all sang.

The young woman asked Eileen if she had another request. Eileen replied, Can you play Bob Marley’s ‘Everything’s Gonna Be Alright’? The sweetness of the guitar accompanied by all our voices singing Everything’s Gonna Be Alright,joined Eileen. The song radiated her gift of unconditional acceptance that had been her mantra throughout her life.

Just a few days later, she closed her eyes for the last time. She requested that she be cremated and her ashes cast into Bita Bay on Long Beach in Green Turtle Cay—a short walk from her GTC home. Just before dawn, everyone gathered at the beach. While the sun came up in a brilliant display, her family cast her into the sea, singing, Everything’s Gonna be all right.

Who are you to judge the life I live? I know I’m not perfect, and I don’t live to be. But, before you start pointing fingers, make sure your hands are clean.

—Bob Marley (Jamaican Singer, Composer and Guitarist. 1945-1981)

Discovering Paradise

In 1967, National Geographic magazine published an article about the Bahamas: A Paradise of 700 Islands. While reading it, my husband, Irving, called out to me, You won’t believe this. There is a picture of Curtis Mendelson on a large fishing boat, strapped in a fighting chair and battling a large tuna. He looks great, like Ernest Hemingway. Curt’s long legs straddled the fishing pole. His athletic, muscular body arched forward over the reel; a salt-and-pepper beard hugged his intense face. Yanked from his chair by 360 pounds of hooked fury, Dr. Curtis Mendelson battles a bluefin during the International Tuna Match off Bimini, read the caption.

In 1951, Curt was my husband’s professor of obstetrics and gynecology. At age forty-two, Curt bolted from a busy New York City medical practice to live and work on an out island in the Bahamas and to pursue his first love—fishing. My husband had just celebrated his forty-second birthday, and fishing was also his first love. Besides, who doesn’t love paradise? Curt had done what most men only dream about, and Irv’s reaction to seeing this picture was, Who’s crazy?

Curt’s colleagues, as Irving knew, judged him to have flipped out. Curt had been a physician with a Park Avenue practice, a professor at a prestigious New York hospital, and author of a widely acclaimed textbook on cardiac diseases in pregnancy. He had all the fringe benefits that accompany success in life: a showplace home on the water in Sands Point, Long Island; a private amphibian plane; and a wife, Marie, who had successfully published a definitive textbook on nutrition.

You can add to his possessions a maverick personality. He flew his plane over the seven hundred islands in the Bahamas in search of a small out island for his new home. When he flew over the Abaco Islands and sighted Green Turtle Cay, he said to his wife, I hope the fuck you like this place, Marie, because this is where we are going to live. They had no children, plenty of funds, and she was a co-operative wife. He was destined to be the island’s doctor for over thirty years.

My husband’s memories of Curt dated back to the early 1950s, when Irving was twenty-six years old and a resident on call in labor and delivery at a New York hospital. One night, he was to notify Curt when his patient was close to her delivery time. Curt responded to his call, I’ll be there in a few minutes. This puzzled my husband, because Curt’s home was over an hour from the hospital. What Irving later learned was that Curt had landed his seaplane on the East River, jumped onto his Honda motorcycle parked at the landing area, and biked in and out of the traffic along the East River Drive to the medical center in record time. When he arrived at labor and delivery, he punched my husband in the ribs and said, OK, Wet Fork, I’m here. Let’s deliver the patient. (Wet Fork was Curt’s nickname for Irving, since his mnemonic for Irving’s last name was Dry Spoon.)

One never knows when a mental seed is planted, but that 1967 National Geographic article planted a mental seed for us that would sprout seven years later, when we would reconnect with Curt. We were thinking ahead to 1975, when my husband would celebrate his fiftieth birthday. Thoughts of retirement are part of the aging syndrome, and so it was with my spouse. Our fantasy was a special family vacation retreat that would give us a variety of choices, all warm. We were ready to run from New York state’s winter weather, and researching potential vacation areas was exciting.

Our criteria in order of importance: good fishing, good fishing, good fishing. We were naive as to economics and politics. Our romantic visions clouded practicalities. We had been to the islands of Jamaica, Antigua, Puerto Rico, Curacao, Martinique, and St. Thomas. We had travelled to Canada, Mexico, France, Switzerland, Scotland, Ireland, England, and Brazil. We had crossed the continental U.S.A. north, south, east, and west. Now, with a different intention, we scheduled new explorations.

We started with the Florida Keys. Since fishing was our prerequisite, we hired professional guides to acquaint us with the habitat of the bonefish and tarpon from Key Largo to Key West. We never saw a bonefish or a tarpon. As we were being poled along the flats, we did have a shark chase a live shrimp left dangling on a fishing line in the water. At the end of our trip, we didn’t discount Florida completely; fishing is, after all, unpredictable. However, the bumper-to-bumper traffic on A1A highway, along with the proliferation of mobile home parks, negated the romance for us. We returned home disappointed.

At this time, our youngest daughter, Nancy, was fifteen. She had recently visited with a Bahamian school friend, Debby Morley, at their family home on Harbour Island in the Bahamas. Nancy convinced us, by her description of the pink-sand beaches and the clearness of the water, that we should research the Bahamian out islands, since they were known for fishing. In the spring of 1974, we booked our introductory trip to the Bahamas. We planned to meet with John Morley in Nassau before researching Abaco, Green Turtle Cay, and Curt. As a realtor, John would have valuable information for us, and we were eager to find out how Curt’s retirement decision had held up over the years. We would take a flight to Nassau, have a short stay on Paradise Island, and continue on to the out islands of Abaco, where we had reserved a villa at the Treasure Cay Hotel and Resort.

Our trip from the U.S. was an environmental enlightenment. As we approached the Bahamas, the change in the color of the sea was dramatic. The dark, murky waters of the polluted Florida shoreline changed from a dark blue to a lighter blue, and then to a radiant blue-green. In the Bahamas, the white sand was most visible in the tidal area, called flats, around the islands. We learned that these flats were the quintessential game-fishing arenas for bonefish. My husband, on his fishing quest, had graduated from trout and salmon and now dreamed about the pursuit of the elusive bonefish.

After checking in at our hotel on Paradise Island, we were eager to explore the city. We spent two hours trying to catch the transport bus to downtown Nassau. You would think we were speaking a different language. We were never in the right place at the right time. After running a marathon from station to station, we managed to catch the bus at one of the casinos and to catch our breath on the ride to town. Tourists streamed into the streets. Smartly dressed police in black, red, and white uniforms were in polite evidence. We breezed through the shops just to get an impression, walked the waterfront, and then went for our meeting with Morley Realtors.

John Morley was eager to help. We told him we wanted great fishing, a location accessible to an airport, and a simple cottage, because we couldn’t spend big bucks. He advised us to go to Treasure Cay since it was a new development on the island of Abaco and well financed.

Several airlines provide service. One is a Florida airline called Mackey; also the national airline of the Bahamas, Bahamas Air. This resort resembles the typical Florida complex: private homes, condominiums, an eighteen-hole golf course, all-weather tennis courts, hotel facility, a large luxury marina, a small shopping center, and a beach designated as one of the most beautiful in the world. The home purchasers are primarily from Germany, Britain, Canada, and the U.S.A. As for a home, you would be wise to buy a finished product. Island construction is not for the innocent. Beware of buying land; titles are frequently not clear. Squatters claim the land and then sell the bush to innocent foreigners. He emphatically added, Whatever you do, don’t build. One last piece of advice: Try to find land on the water.

We found Treasure Cay to be as he had described it. Our vision of our retirement home was enhanced by our stroll on the white-sand beach in front of our rented villa and the view of Green Turtle Cay in the distance. Our curiosity was bursting to see how Curt had fared over the years. However, trying to connect with him brought another enlightenment. There was only one phone available for public use at Treasure Cay, and we waited for our turn to use it.

Curt was surprised and pleased to receive our call. He advised us, Take the morning ferry and I will meet you at the village dock. Plan on staying for lunch. I want you to see my home and meet my wife, Marie. We have lots to catch up on.

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Ferry that services Green Turtle Cay and Treasure Cay.

The ferry ride from Treasure Cay to Green Turtle was another environmental gift. The green and white ferry was small, windowed, and friendly in the sea that stretched just a few miles from shore to shore. As we approached GTC, the village looked as though it had jumped out of a painting by Alton Lowe, the leading Bahamian artist at that time. Multicolored clapboard houses, some with decorative stone walls and picket fences in front, appeared to wrap the village with a fringe. A stone dock used for larger vessels jutted out into the sea. The geography of the three harbors—White Sound, New Plymouth, and Black Sound—resembled a turtle.

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Discovering Paradise

The ferry brought us to the New Plymouth dock, since this was the heart of the village. We knew that the island was only three miles long and one and a half mile wide, with a population of about four hundred people, of which ten percent were non-Bahamian: American, English, German, and Canadian. On our ferry ride, some of this population diversity was evident. This first trip was magical in every way and would continue to be magical through many years.

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Welcome to Green Turtle Cay

Curt was waiting at the dock and looked just like the picture that had captured our imagination. With a big smile, he escorted us to a small dockside restaurant for lunch. On entering, he addressed a motherly looking woman behind the counter.

This is Mz. Vina Bethell. I call her Wiener Schnitzel. She’s the best cook on the island.

We discovered that the locals had a speech pattern that pronounced a w like a v and dated back to the original British Loyalists. Historically, following the American Revolutionary War in 1784, Green Turtle Cay had been a land grant gifted by the British to loyal subjects. Many were plantation owners who were forced to leave the States, and they brought with them their African slaves. Green Turtle Cay still reflected this population diversity when we arrived, with about a fifty-fifty black to white ratio. The plantation owners had believed they could grow cotton in the Bahamas, but they found the coral islands unsuitable. Later in this day, I saw one sad cotton plant growing in the village. It stood as a symbol for the many generations that had passed. These first Abaco settlers had to look to the sea for their livelihood, through fishing, sponging, shipbuilding, and salvaging the contents of disabled ships that collided with the unmarked reefs off shore.

Curt was eager for us to see his home and to meet Marie. She was a match for Curt. Here was a woman of professional status who willingly lived in intellectual isolation on a small island while maintaining her publishing connections. She had revised her nutrition book throughout the years with a co-author. Royalties from the sale of her book, which was used as a learning tool in many nursing programs, provided them with an ongoing income—rare for this kind of book. She looked like a transplant from New York City: tall and slim with improved blond hair. Her face was seamed from the sun and from the inhospitality of her island life. I noticed during our visit that her face had a serious gaze that seemed to find some difficulty translating to a smile.

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Curtis and Marie Mendelson.

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Island road in 1975

Curt proudly informed us that his American architect duplicated the house they had left behind in Long Island. Their house of native stone, with a matching courtyard swimming pool, was perched on an elevation overlooking the flats facing Treasure Cay. Even the elevation was a luxury in the Bahamas, since very few islands offer this. Throw in the schools of bonefish feeding below his deck, and you can imagine our reaction. The fish slapped their tails in the water in applause.

The excitement generated by seeing our first bonefish triggered the second most impulsive decision of our lives. We wanted a house there. (Our first most impulsive decision had been the decision to marry each other after our first date.) Since we were approaching our twenty-fifth anniversary, you can conclude that impulsiveness was not one of our intrinsic character traits.

My husband blurted out, Is anything for sale here?

Our professor replied, I just happen to have the key to a home in the village on New Plymouth Harbor. The house is offered at a modest price. An American yachtsman purchased the property a year ago after a tragedy—he and his wife lost a child. They spent the year repairing the house and their psyches and have returned to the United States.

We agreed to look at the house. It was a five-minute walk to the village. A primitive coral roadbed led past the Batelco telephone station and the schoolhouse that overlooked the sea. Curt said, Bible study is a big part of their curriculum. Miss Amy, the schoolteacher, has instructed several generations here.

As we passed the phone station, the elevation served up a view of the village below that was breathtaking. A large poinciana tree filled with red blooms decorated the front of a cottage on the right side of the roadbed halfway down a very steep hill. The road split into two forks at the lower level, giving us the choice to enter an area of clustered homes and shops. We could see the cemetery ahead of the fork on our left, and Curt directed us to proceed this way. The raised graves with concrete caps bore the names of the original settlers and their descendents, with the sea snuggled up to one side. Opposite the cemetery, a small, vintage concrete jail with minuscule barred windows stood as a reminder of the incarceration of criminals in the old days.

Everything in the village was to scale. The people were small. The clapboard houses were small and painted in shades of blue, yellow, pink, and white. Many dated back to the early 1800s, when the Loyalists settled there. Narrow alleyways connected to the streets. An occasional chain link fence and some new construction with stucco over concrete block jarred the Old World image. Even the post office was in one of the old conch homes. Its porch entrance had one wall with postings that invited our imagination to take flight. The entire village was surrounded by water.

Curt said, Two related Lowe families own grocery stores right next to each other on the main street. And the Curry family have their shop on the other side of the village. Real nice people. We knew that on an island, groceries included more than food. We concluded that diplomacy would always have to be in our minds when shopping. Curt continued, Shopping for groceries usually includes an exchange of island information. The owners are self-appointed public relations representatives.

Along our way, Curt pointed out interesting sights. At one point he said, There’s one of my patients. We looked around. There was not a person in sight. The pig, you dummies, the pig. We looked in the direction he indicated, and there was his patient: a large, fat pig penned up at the side of a house. Being addressed as dummies surprised as, but we focused on the humor of the moment. I’m practising veterinarian medicine as well as delivering babies and treating all other diseases of men, women, and children, Curt said.

This was a fisherman who had completely restructured his vocation for his avocation. Within an hour, we had looked at the village house, given him a purchase price and a binder for the owner, and departed on the ferry back to Treasure Cay. We didn’t even have time to walk on the Green Turtle beaches. The bonefish clapping was enough to persuade us.

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Historic Jail

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Village Cemetery

One week later, we were back to family and reality. I had just returned from grocery shopping and found my husband sitting by the phone with a faraway look in his eyes. I asked, Did we get the house?

He replied, There’s been a little change.

What change?

He stammered, Well, Curt wants to build us a house.

Curt, our professor-fisherman, was now going to build us a house. I was shocked with this news. What happened? I asked.

My husband replied that Curt told him there was a new bar going in next door to that house you are going to buy. Unless you want to rock and roll all night, I think you should reconsider the location. He offered to sell us an acre of his land across from his Sands Point mansion. We would have one hundred feet of waterfront on Black Sound Harbour for a dock. He would build us a house comparable to the