There is a lot of strength, love, enchantment and feistiness behind the soft hands clenching on mine, when our hands are forcefully and painfully pulled apart and she doesn’t want to let go, as if the story should have no definitive endings other than the temporary breaks to inhale, dream, search for the memory, exhale, smile, in absolute freedom, until the caretaker and another woman shatter the silence and abruptly drag her away “to rest”. But she doesn’t want that. She gets angry. She barely came in to do her volunteering work.
There is a lot of strength, love, enchantment and feistiness behind the soft hands clenching on mine, when our hands are forcefully and painfully pulled apart and she doesn’t want to let go, as if the story should have no definitive endings other than the temporary breaks to inhale, dream, search for the memory, exhale, smile, in absolute freedom, until the caretaker and another woman shatter the silence and abruptly drag her away “to rest”. But she doesn’t want that. She gets angry. She barely came in to do her volunteering work. “No, I enjoy doing this (telling stories). And the more things you take away from a person like me, the worst I feel.”
She is brave and innocent in the same time, a gift that graced her to win huge victories in her life. She is holding all the place she has left for all the chances she gets for life to flow uninterrupted, caressing her sinuous wrinkles following the movement of spoken words in earnest, around her breezy blue eyes staring into the unseen, teasing her impeccable snowy hair so tenderly cozying up around her darling face, embracing her rightfully earned fragility – it takes a miraculously strong woman like her to be this vulnerable in the open, the story of her life that’s holding her up straight, way up in the air, where Kouns can float like a guardian angel with her never-ending story about all of us, already a century old hero, above a town that’s as close to her heart as her flesh, with streets slowing down through her veins, people as dear to her as the air she breaths, all of this intertwined with the faith in God still fresh and passionate and self-defining.
This is Edna Swink Kouns at 103 years old, amusingly answering her own questions for the most part and ignoring mine. My questions are coming from the outside of her world matrix, still wondering about things, while Edna is in the knowing, with the syntax of understanding life set in stone, revelations already in place through God, punctuation on valuable lessons rhythmically pulsating with a divine cadence. She is one with this community and her way of life is the people’s way of life through the last century. Her story is this town’s story to such extent that when you look at her, you see Lakeside through and through. And that’s all she wants to talk about. Edna, what games did you like playing with your friends when you were a kid? Having in mind an old picture with the bunch of joyous younglings running in front of the Lakeside Grammar School when it was still a trailer before the fire, boys in overalls, girls in over the knees dark skirts, and it looks like they were up to no good during the recess, judging by the way few grown ups seem to have jumped aside, outrage plastered all over their face.
“Lakeside people were really friendly, they always helped each other and still are. Everybody is kind and very helpful. We do things to make people feel happy. I always worked with people, being involved in social groups, school groups, Sunday school and that’s what counts, what you do for other people,” she said.
Edna is losing her voice trying to prolong each sentence to fit in more meaning with consuming passion that takes a toll on her fragile frame, to invest more wisdom, all her legacy and love for people, but most always to include a firm call to action. All of her stories have a moral. One that she seems to have learned early on, without much struggle and she repeats it often and with resolve, “People have to be kind. Don’t criticize, take a vote if you disagree, but you have to listen to each other.”
I wish she would tell me how does she think the women of her generation compare with the modern women, are we having it all, how hard was it for them, how are we doing, but she is floating back in time when she borrowed her father’s Buick and put a dent and some scratches on. Edna had the steady love of her father and also his forgiveness, to the shock of her girl pals who were scared she would be punished. “Did you do it on purpose?” asked her father. “No,” she answered and then he said, “Ok, be a little more careful next time.”
I try to place her at the intersection of old Woodside with Maine, stopping for gas and maybe ringing the famous bell at the now gone Long’s car service joint. At different times, she might have shared giggles with her friends in the generous shade offered by the fifty Cork Elm trees planted there at the end of the 19th century on each side of the road up until 1961 when each and one of them were cut down to make room for an insatiable and louder world. Edna was riding her own Jeep in the 40’s already and she must have visited Ed Harrison’s mobile gas station, which also hosted the first Lakeside fire fighters volunteers. She was already married by then, with children, teaching special needs kids as a substitute at the schools all over town and she did it with love, dedication and pride for 50 years.
She softly inhales, looking down, her hands fluid as if ready for a prayer. She remembers about “this little boy who got ran over on his neck on the highway” and had serious difficulties bonding with other teachers. Everybody warned Edna this is an impossible cause, but as predictable as the sunrise, Edna and the boy became inseparable.
“I told them, that poor kid works so hard to even exist, if we would be in his position, we wouldn’t do half as well, so let’s be kind to him, think of the effect is gonna have on him…Wait, this is bragging (she laughs), every time a teacher wanted a substitute, they would say, Get Edna!”
The sunny amber light filters nicely and lovingly through the stained window at the old Presbyterian Church, which is now hosting the Lakeside Historical Society Edna helped found back in 1972 when her hair “was red and I was always embarrassed, people called me copperhead and rusty head.” Edna smiles contently, the icon of kindness, staring ahead through the elaborate vintage red and black shawl adorning one of the pianos in the room usually opened for weddings and community events.
What is the secret to a long life – that is a question I know people would want to ask Edna and I oblige, but I care more about her bucket list, if she has any unfulfilled dreams, if there is a tossed note somewhere containing a secret list about what could have Edna become if her destiny would have picked another world to wave in.
“Always be kind to people. Take part in activities that are going to help somebody else. Keep busy, keep it interesting. I used to go around and play music for people in nursing homes, I worked a great deal with special needs kids…”
Then she tells me again the story of the little boy who got ran over his neck and how she managed to find money to buy the old church. There is an undeniable force flaming steadily with mesmerizing purity inside this beautiful woman and I don’t see any beating around the bush or short cuts. She has a very meticulous approach, laser focus take on reality, knows what’s relevant and loves, absolutely loves to share it. There are no hidden places other than the crevices left by the waltzing of time into her soft, honey-warm skin. She is all the way out there in the open with everything she’s got, straight shooting arrow, telling it as it is, with kindness, of course, as kindness is her life long mission.
“You know, I don’t think I have any regrets. I did more or less what I wanted. I mind you, I knew what is right and what is wrong and always tried to remember those things and do what I’ve been taught to do. I had a good life, never heard my parents argue, they didn’t drink, they didn’t smoke.”
Her mother’s father, Arthur Foster, was born in Maine in 1857 and married Harriet Frost, a British teacher whose mother died when she was young. Harriet’s father set out to travel to the USA for work and promised he will be back to bring her with him later on, but Harriet got impatient when she reached 16 years old and got on a ship to America at the same time her father got on a ship back to Great Britain. They never met again. And Edna inherited the same resolve.
Edna lived in Lakeside most of her life, excepting for a couple of years after the big flood in 1916 devastated El Monte Valley and destroyed her parents’ ranch. On January 13, when the storm that lasted over two weeks hit, dozens of houses, bridges and barns along with miles of the Cuyamaca Flume and railroad tracks vanished.
“My mother drove a team of horses, while my dad drove all the rest and the cattle that he had. We went up the side of the mountain on Mussy Grade Road toward Ramona, but my cousins, all Fosters, stayed here. This has been a great place to grow and my grandmother and a lot of my family lived here.”
When Edna’s family came back, the parents bought a house on Lemon Crest, which is still standing, and Edna started school at the historical “Second School” (built in 1912) on Channel Road she later helped save from demolition, then continuing at the Lakeside Grammar School where she soon became a member of the music band along with all her 25 first cousins, part of the Foster clan. Edna used to play violin, bass and the saxophone and you can find Edna still dancing and playing the upright bass on the stage just a little ahead of her 102nd birthday last year with Ass Pocket Whiskey Fellas. Square dancing was her favorite and never succeeded to persuade Erman Kouns to learn. She is not playing the piano anymore, but is trying to help her great, great grandchildren learn. After graduating from Grossmont High School in 1932 and four years later from San Diego State College, Edna married Erman Kouns and together they built a rock house on Wintergarden Blvd, still there. On the porch, the wind playfully swings the American flag in the air, letting everybody know that a proud woman lives there. Edna receives hundreds of visitors each year on her birthday, family, friends and admirers from all over the country, graciously hosting some.“They sleep on the floors all over my house,” she laughs, earnestly giving interviews to reporters remembering about the centennial woman at least once a year.
Among her dearest memories are the joyous family picnics at the El Monte Park where everybody’s names are now encrusted into one of the stone table. Hundreds of people attended half a century ago, with kids braving the rudimentary slides or merry-go-around and the seesaws catapulting its occupants high in the air with no rubbery surface to land on, riding their bicycles on the park’s trails with no helmets. The old oaks are still there, flanking the rocky mountainside, with a view to remember from the legendary Wedding Tree, across and down the road from the alcohol rehabilitation buildings, there in the 30s. Above it all stands the harshly sculpted El Cajon mountain, looking over the pristine El Monte Valley, the ancient home of the Kumeyaay Natives. The valley was initially designated as the Capitan Grande Indian Reservation back in the 19th century, but it was bought without consent in the early 30s by the city of San Diego and the natives were forced to move to Barona and Viejas and leave behind their beloved valley taken over by the El Capitan Reservoir Dam built in 1935. Wild turkeys and deer, foxes and coyotes are still roaming the area, along with mountain lions and rattle snakes. From up above, the bald eagle is saluting the past, making its nest high up the top of the mountain. Edna witnessed most of this and the Lakesiders are looking to the past through her eyes, seeking to build up on the community spirit she worships so much.
Another traditional community gathering was the Easter Sunrise service at the Kip Hering ranch at the West end of the valley, a ceremony that started in the late 50s and brought hundreds of people from all over the county. The ranch is now hosting the Lakeside Polo Grounds founded at about the same times. People came on horses or riding in carriages on the dirt two-lane road that was I-8 or down Highway 67 through the dusty sand pits that started plaguing the town. Having to wake up at the crack of down to make it on time, no matter the distance, it soon became a yearly ritual nobody wanted to miss. This is just another story illustrating how Lakeside was always “a close knit where people are always willing to pitch in and do what it has to be done.”
It’s hard to separate Lakeside from Edna Kouns and tell one’s story by leaving the other’s out. Her life and actions are so deeply intertwined into the fabric waving the essence of this town, that she is just the strong thread that holds everything in place. They should correct the maps: Edna’s Lakeside, California. Talking about Edna with Edna means talking about Lakeside and will always have to include old tales about Lakeside Inn opening the gates for the victims of the floods at no cost and the boat house at Lindo Lake where everybody went fishing, out for a picnic, to throw the horseshoe or race in the three-legged competition back in the days, before going to watch the “Green Dragon” car race at the near by racetracks; the family fun maybe amazed at the skills pulled by trick roper Bob Immenshuch at the rodeo, first hosted on Emil Klicka’s property in 1920 and then moved to the current location on Mapleview in1933 by the newly created Lakeside Rodeo Association; how she taught Sunday Bible study classes inside the very room we are now sitting inside the historical landmark one block down from the Lakeside Library; the outings with friends and family to the local movie theatre still erect on Maine Street. Edna suddenly recalls how she started doing the bookkeeping for H.S. Kibbey, Lumber and Hardware on Maine and I start wondering, but I soon forget to ask, if she ever met Flosie Beadle, another clear cut diamond and legendary woman of Lakeside, who chained herself on the Elm trees on Woodside trying to save them from being cut down in 1961. Flosie luckily succeeded to save the boathouse at Lindo Lake though.
At 103 years old, Edna is still actively involved in the community, coming to the church to help the Historical Society with the archival work every single Wednesday, a caretaker by her side. Along with other volunteers, Edna managed to complete over 300 scrapbooks illustrating Lakeside’s past. Part of these old pictures are included in the “Legends of Lakeside,” one of the books Edna helped complete, along with “Dairies of Lakeside, 1886-2008” and “Schools of Lakeside, 1883-2011.”
The Wednesday of the interview, she looks classy with dark trousers matching her checkered velvet tunic sweater, a coquettish modern long silver necklace adorned with charms and pearls that could still not compete in shine with the fiery sparkles in her eyes, silky nails short and neatly trimmed, beautiful touch. Edna is an incredibly bright woman and her rational mind aligns with her unbreakable faith. The list of her accomplishments is long and dense, with Edna being a founding member of so many non-profits and groups around town, such as The Garden Club, Women’s Club of Lakeside, the PTA of EL Capitan High School when she helped build houses for the kids who could not make it to college. Edna was also part of the local initiative “The Mile Of Trees” along with Clarence Harris to plant over 350 Jacaranda trees on Wintergarden Blvd in the late 90s or the Biblical carob trees around the church. The reason why we are all able to see the historical Otto Marck monument in front of the Lakeside Elementary School is because Edna got involved and because nobody can win against Edna when Edna is in the righteous fighting mode.
Everybody adores Edna and surrounds her with love and gratitude. She has been recognized with numerous awards, earning the “Woman of Distinction” and the “Ben Dixon” award, being nominated “Citizen of the Year,” among others. The San Diego County Board of Supervisors proclaimed her birthday on June 15 as the “Edna Kouns Day” to recognize all her relentless volunteering work in the service of the community.
The red light stops blinking, the video recording is over, but Edna doesn’t want to stop and instead keeps going, vivacious and still eager to flutter her stories from above like fairy dust, actually more like blessings, covering the world back in wonder and magic, still siding every reencounter with her special words of wisdom “Be kind to one another.”
“Do you see that corner over there?” I look. “That’s where we keep the blackout curtains used by the church during the First World War when people were scared. Hopefully, everything we are doing here will benefit a lot of people.”
Then, turning her face toward the iridescent loving light translated through the colored glass windows from the outside world straight into her heart by the way of a rock solid faith, the amber, loving light she is made of.
Edna talks out loud to herself, “hopefully, all of this will last”
Ӏ am sure this paragraph has
Ӏ am sure this paragraph has touched all the internet viewers, its
really really nice piece of writing on building up new webpage.