For as long as she can remember, Treena has been surrounded by music. Her earliest memories are of church hymns when her father served as an assistant pastor in Waterloo, Iowa. When Treena was five, the family moved back to her father’s hometown of Altoona, Pennsylvania, where she has memories of her mother teaching piano lessons and her father playing the violin.
Treena followed in her parents’ musical footsteps by playing clarinet in grade school and later piano. She joined the orchestra and concert band, and even won a contest to play with the Altoona Symphony when she was in high school.
“My closest friends were church people and music people,” Treena remembered.
Memories rooted in music
But it was summers spent in Chautauqua, New York—more than three hours from her hometown—where her love of music truly blossomed. The Chautauqua Institution—originally founded in 1874 as the Chautauqua Lake Sunday School Assembly—formed as an educational experiment for learning outside of a traditional school. It grew into a place where people could spend their summers learning and refining various skills, especially in a wide range of musical disciplines.
Starting after 7th grade and continuing through high school, this was the place Treena honed her piano skills. She has wonderful memories attending musicals at the outdoor amphitheater, watching symphony orchestra and ballet practice, and hanging out at the beach at night.
“It’s a place where you are kind of away from the real world,” Treena explained. “It was truly one of the best experiences of my young life.”
The path to becoming a mother
Treena went on to major in music in college, and soon met a young man with the same major. The two married young, but it was nothing like Treena envisioned. When her husband began dating some of his music students, the couple divorced, leaving Treena heartbroken and wondering what was next.
The divorce was doubly devastating because Treena longed to become a mother. Now, she wasn’t sure she’d have the chance. “I prayed a lot about it—I had the need to have a child in my life,” Treena said. “For some reason I had always pictured a little girl with dark hair and dark eyes.”
She began reading books on adoption and decided to pursue the process as a single woman. Her father accompanied her to visit an adoption agency, where a case worker revealed a large notebook filled with children’s photographs from other countries.
She learned about the option to adopt from Honduras and started the paperwork in July 1988. A little more than a year later, she got the call that a baby girl was born—the baby that would become her daughter, Marita.
“She’s the closest thing to my heart, and a wonderful answer to all my prayers,” Treena said.
A mother and daughter’s return to joy
Treena raised Marita on her own, while working at the police department and later at Child Protective Services (CPS). She moved to Texas and continued to fill their lives with music through church and other volunteer efforts.
Later, when Marita was teenager, Treena met a man who also worked at CPS. She thought she had finally met someone she could grow old with. But the man turned out to be very controlling and abusive to Treena. Before long, it was back to mother and daughter again, just like in the beginning.
Through the challenges of life, Treena never forgot the peace that her music-filled summers in Chautauqua gave her. She had always wanted to go back, but limited finances and the long distance from Texas kept her from doing so.
Her greatest wish was to return to the place that had brought her so much joy with the person who brings her the most joy—her only daughter, Marita. Wish of a Lifetime was thrilled to give Treena the chance to share her memories of Chautauqua with Marita.
As Treena walked the grounds of Chautauqua with her daughter, all her memories came flooding back. They visited the house where she used to stay, walked around the lake, and breathed in the flowers in the midst of a summer breeze. In the evening, the two attended a Grieg Piano Concerto performed by the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra.
“I knew all the music, and it was just gorgeous,” Treena recalled. “It was just like it always was.”
For a woman who once thought she couldn’t become a mother and the girl who needed one, the trip was a perfect time for the two of them to slow down and reconnect with their shared history.
“There were some things that had changed, but it was still the best kind of calm and peace and just so relaxing. Marita felt the same way,” Treena said. “It has all been such a great experience for the two of us.”
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