Desktop Photo

We are drinking tea

on the bench in my yard,

one of so few photos I can find of

me and my sister.

We did not have adventures,

we just pottered about.

What was there to photograph.

I set the picture as my wallpaper,

and now her smiling eyes

meet mine over the top of the open window.

I want to return to that day

and lean in closer,

maybe rest my head on her shoulder

for a moment.

'One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot' by Marianne Cronin was another 'lovely cup of tea' book. I think I saw it in one of those 'what I'm reading this summer' articles and then coincidentally found it in the Oxfam bookshop. Its another book about people dying, what the hell, my life has been populated by them in the last few months, or maybe lots of books have dying people in them and I just never noticed it in the same way. Two people, Lenni and Margot, are thrown together by circumstances and form a bond, and tell their stories to each other. That's it really. It's nicely done, and even not too sentimental. I thought maybe they were both going to die, but no ...

But it is also just a book about loss. And this bit was most poignant to me. The 'Temp' is a young woman who establishes the art room at the hospital that brings Lenni and Margot together, and then she reappears at the end when her estranged father is bought to the hospital.

"The Temp and her mother discussed at length that night what The Temp would do; whether she would visit or write, whether she would go alone or with her mother, whether she would ask for the birth certificate that had been replaced long ago, or allow him to keep it. She wondered whether she was angry at his abandonment or pleased at his return, whether she wanted to say goodbye or whether he even deserved a hello. Before their decision was made, however, another call came. The Temp's father had died. The Temp had cried then. It was the equivalent to hearing of the death of a stranger, and hearing of the death of an irretrievable part of herself, all at the same time. A great loss, and yet no loss at all." (p.231)

Stay safe. Be kind.