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The Cottage on the Isle of Harris
When the oldest of the five sisters, Christina, died of tuberculosis, her sisters were grief-stricken. They couldn’t believe it. She was only fourteen.
Some years later, the second oldest, Dorothy, and the third oldest, Mary, immigrated to America and were soon followed by their second-youngest sister, Edith. They and their youngest sister, Isobel, never saw each other again.
Isobel got married, gave birth to three girls and mothered her cousin’s orphaned boy. While I grew up I heard her rarely speak of my aunts. But I knew it was because they weren’t truly gone. Absent; they were even more present. I wonder did they miss Isobel as much.
The house where they all grew up is now left to rot – only the wind takes shelter there. Yet I can hear them! Their cries through the mist of years!
The last time I passed the cottage, I felt sadness sweep through me. But I didn’t grieve only over my mother, my aunts or my sisters but over all the Christinas, Dorothys, Marys, Ediths and Isobels who, and whose struggles are forgotten. However, if I was truly honest, I wept out of self-pity.
Well well well, grammar well withheld 😉