Caroline’s Legacy ~ Mela Saylor
I believe our lives are filled with trajectories, those choices we make - or are made for us - that send each of us off in different directions at just the right moment in time, taking us where we ultimately are supposed to be. One such trajectory was given to me by my mother.
“Here,” my mother shoved a newspaper clipping at me one day. “You should join the Greater Canton Writers’ Guild. You’ve got the time now.”
I officially met Caroline Totten the night of the Christmas party, December 2007. She later told me she called each of the members and asked them to show up giving me a welcome. And they did en mass. The month before, in November, Trish Abruzzi, the president at that time asked me two questions: 1) Would you like to help with the Guild next year? “Oh sure, anything you need.” 2) Could you help with the programming? “yes?” “Congratulations, you’ll be vice president for Caroline.”
I did not see that coming.
During the next ten years Caroline became a close friend and mentor providing me with every opportunity to learn and grow in that position with the responsibilities that came with it.
Caroline Totten began her career as a cub reporter with the Akron Beacon Journal and a freelance journalist for the Canton Repository. She was a charter member of the Greater Canton Writers’ Guild, a member of the Canton Poetry Society, and the Canton Garden Center. This amazing woman was also the visionary who founded the Midwest Writers’ Conference which lasted for thirty years.
During her days with the Mid-West Writers Conference people from all over the country came to little old Canton to attend this event. Caroline was able to lure well-known people to come as keynote speakers. One such person that Caroline met and always talked about afterward– was Rod Serling (Twilight Zone.) Caroline was so nervous about it she told me she giggled almost the whole time while with him driving around Canton.
During the course of the next fifteen years Caroline and I attended many workshops, always, always, getting lost on the way there and back, but having a blast doing so. On one particular jaunt to Wayne County, we were lost, of course (I did mention it was always me who was driving, didn't I?) and meandering up and down the rolling hills. Caroline, with one foot on an imaginary brake and her right hand clutching the door handle, kept looking wide-eyed at the fast moving farmland, trees, cows, and occasional buggy we had to bypass, kept murmuring “wow, who knew all this was out here!”
Her forte was short stories and poetry, having an untold amount published both in print and online. She did write one novel that I’m aware of, a post-apocalyptic story that she named “Loom” and sent it to me electronically. I was glued to my computer until the very end. That fantastic story was eventually put aside and never published.
A lot of our time together was spent sitting around her kitchen table with a cup of tea discussing all manner of things.
“Oh the stories I could tell” she would say, alluding to much but never naming names. She kept confidences well.
In her home, she had a book-lined study where she spent her time writing. It had a faint smell of hope and secrets from long ago. There was a side door in there which led to a small patio overlooking her large herb garden. It was a beautiful area with both flowers and herbs mingling together. We sat out there one late afternoon and she pointed to a large limb that had fallen from a massive tree on her property a few days earlier.
“See this finger?” She flexed her right index finger. “It’s magic.”
“What do you mean?” A fainted breeze stirred in the air.
“I had a talk with that tree a few days ago” Caroline announced, her twinkling blue eyes lit up in merriment.
“What did you say?”
“I told it that that limb had to go – and it fell off that night.”
Caroline became like a second mother to me. I could talk to her about anything - and I did. Many times I called her about things that were going on in my life and the Guild. I could almost hear her eyes roll as she sighed and gave me her perspective on whatever had me upset. At this point in her life she really had "seen it all" and was a stabilizing presence in my life.
This talented and nurturing woman was also a devoted herbalist who loved her garden. She knew everything and could put together poultices and remedies, many times sending me home with something for one ailment or another. She was also a staunch advocate for the honeybees.
I was blest to have had Caroline in my life. When I think of her I can still see her standing in the middle of her garden holding her floppy straw hat on her head while bees and butterflies danced around her in the summer breeze.
