Conversations at family dinners are decidedly different when there are newly discovered blood relatives in attendance. My older sister gave a baby up for adoption in 1963; Mother and son were re-united last summer. The re-unification has been exciting, a genuine pleasure for all of us as we get to know this man and his family. (I assume he feels the same, he keeps showing up to family functions. {Smile!})

At Easter the conversation covered a lot of family history. One particular story led to a lot of ‘what-if’ scenarios;

In 1967, my parents and my aunt took my sister and me on a vacation to Jamaica. We stayed in Port Antonio, at the aptly named Blue Mountain Resort. The road that led up to the hotel was steep and narrow, cut from the side of the mountain. 

On our second day there we piled into our rental car; I can’t recall what the plans had been because we never got to where we were going. Full of anticipation, we cruised out of the parking lot and discovered the car had no brakes. 

It was a standard vehicle so my Father immediately shifted gears to gain as much control as possible. Just to add to the complication, in Jamaica cars drive on the opposite side to Canada. To the left of us, the mountain rose straight up, to the right of us, there was a steep decline down the mountainside.

Normally, my Mother would have squealed, and clutched and clawed at my Father’s shoulder but this time, she remained uncharacteristically calm and let the man concentrate. 

In the back seat, I sat between my aunt and sister. My aunt, (picture Miss Marple crossed with a liberal version of Margaret Thatcher) calmly folded her glasses into her hand so they wouldn’t get broken. She put her other hand over my mouth. To this day I insist it was my sister screaming, not I. 

A waiter walked up the road on his way to work. My Father had to move to the right, toward the cliff side, to avoid hitting him.  

“We haven’t got any brakes!” my Mother yelled as we zipped past. There was nothing he could do, but I suppose she thought it would help.

The road steepened and my Father fought for control. If he were able to successfully maneuver us all the way down the mountain, we would go through the stop sign at the end and out onto a busy street. He had a lot to think about. In desperation, he tried to bank the car to the left into the mountainside, hopefully to slow us down, but optimally to bring us to a full stop.

He steered the car to where there was a bit of an abutment. We were moving too fast, the car was knocked off balance, it tipped to the right onto two wheels, landed back on all fours, but now we were out of control.

Over the cliff we went.

It was a steep drop. What saved us was the thick vegetation. Our car stayed upright and we thumped and bumped our way to a full stop amongst the bushes and trees.

I was twelve, my sister sixteen. My chest still tightens when I picture my Mother’s face as she turned around to see if we were all right. She must have been petrified, her eyes round and wide;

“Is everybody okay?”

We all confirmed, no injuries, barely any bumps or bruises. And my Mother’s next question?

“Where’s my camera?”

There were stretches on that road where our car could have rolled end to end with nothing to stop it. Had we gone over the edge at any of those points we would not have been so fortunate. There is more to the story, but to get back to the family dinner conversation, we couldn’t help but consider all the scenarios if the ending had been otherwise.

What-if scenarios are fun, but alternate endings exist only in our imagination. In this story, the ending is a positive one; my family and I walked away unscathed. What-ifs (and their cousins, the ‘if-onlys’) should generally be considered as the vampires of mental energy. We can’t possibly know what might have been. There is no substitute for the reality of what-is. At Easter, we were grateful to be there, to toast each other for what could have happened, but didn’t.

Keep your joy.

Anne Milne is an every Sunday blogger, unless it’s a holiday weekend. Or summertime. Facebook or email.