My family has lived on Cumberland Island for seven generations. There are no paved roads, no stores. Only 38 of us live here. One of my favorite things to do is walk the tide line looking for treasures. I’ve found a 25-pound woolly mammoth molar, alligator skulls, a camel’s tooth, rattlesnake ribs, thousands of things, but when I found this petrified shark’s tooth, I could not put it down. There’s almost an electricity that runs between you and the tooth. The tooth is millions of years old, and it was millions of years old before the Timucua Indians, who once occupied the island, made it into an arrowhead. After they’d used it as a weapon, they drilled it and used it as adornment. Which is also how I use it. I’m fascinated by this overlay of history—think of all the hands that have touched this object. And one day it will pass through my hands and into my daughter’s.
~ Gogo Ferguson, jewelry designer, Cumberland Island, GA
“MY DAD BROUGHT THIS BACK TO SURPRISE HER.”
In the corner of our guest room I have a tanpura, still in its case, never played.
I grew up in Montreal, and the Bengali community there was really small, like seven kids. On Sundays, we’d get together and sing Bengali songs and do little dramas and dance. My mother was known for her singing and could play the sitar, tabla, harmonium. She could play anything. People would bring their instruments for her to play, but she never had any of her own.
Years later, my dad traveled to India and brought back this tanpura to surprise her. It’s beautiful: 5 feet high and made of dark wood. He got it engraved; on the lower-right side it says, “To my darling Shantona” and the date. He was so happy to give it to her.
Within weeks of his return, my mother was diagnosed with cancer and she passed away not long after. She was 51. She never got to play her tanpura or even hold it. The case still had the luggage tag on it.
My parents were very conservative, and I never saw them share affection; they never said, “I love you,” but I know they really loved each other. My dad passed away last January, and now the instrument is with me. When I look at the tanpura there in the corner, it’s… complicated. It reminds me of my mother and of my mother getting sick but also of my father coming home from the airport, so excited to give it to her, and of the love he had for her.
~ Sonali Roy Son, data scientist, Snapchat; Santa Monica, CA
