Sepia Saturday 186: Auntie Hilda

Brunhilde came to mind immediately. Wagnerian.

But I have nothing that matches - no swords, no armor, no lances.

What I do have is a photo of my Aunt Hilda which is as close to Brunhilde as I can get. She's second from right. Note the gentleman's arm around her waist.

 Hilda never married. Here's a letter from my cousin which offers an explanation.

The pertinent part of the letter reads: "Hilda and Stuart Carroll had a love affair for years but
they were cousins far removed that's why they didn't get married."

All my Irish Catholic aunts were named Mary something and Hilda was Mary Hilda Irene Killeen (1887 - 1968). She was one of my three "maiden" aunts and the oldest of the lot. I knew her only as an elderly woman who wore lisle stockings and those awful clunky shoes with a thick wedge heel and laces up the front..."nun's shoes".  She ended up never marrying which in those days was a tragedy; this letter implies that she never got over Stuart. Instead she worked as a secretary for the Canadian Pacific Railway for 50 years, retiring with the proverbial gold watch. I wish I knew more.

Every Sunday after mass, I would stop in at my "nest of aunts" house which was next door to the church. All three unmarried aunts lived there with my Grandmother. They lived with her for their entire lives. It was a lively home and they treated me as an adult; I loved those visits.  After the last mass on Sunday, the house would be over-flowing with cousins and aunts, chatter filling the air, lots of tea being drunk, kids running in and out of the house. My grandmother sat in a rocking chair presiding over the activities.

Here's a photo of the three maiden aunts and others with my sister in 1947. Hilda is second from right. It's a terrible picture but the only one I have of her. This was a Christmas party but looks more like a funeral. My guess is that they were just going out the door when someone said "Stop - I want to get a picture." No doubt there was fiddling around with lighting and focusing. It would have been very cold outside; December in Winnipeg often brings temperatures well below zero. The ladies were wrapped up in furs and probably very uncomfortable.  My father's white writing on the drapes adds a ironic whimsy to the glum scene. As he was probably the photographer I think he was trying to "put lipstick on a pig" as we say.

 


I searched for an appropriate poem or limerick to add here - something about Hilda and I stumbled on the beautiful poetry of Hilda Doolittle. Out of her vast body of work, I chose Heat for today as I sit in our avocado grove where it's 90 F.  and hear fruit dropping from the trees and thumping into the mulch. While we're waiting for the sea breeze to cut the heat, we can make more guacamole for dinner tonight.

Heat

O wind, rend open the heat,
cut apart the heat,
rend it to tatters.

Fruit cannot drop
through this thick air--
fruit cannot fall into heat
that presses up and blunts
the points of pears
and rounds the grapes.

Cut the heat--
plough through it,
turning it on either side
of your path.

Hilda Doolittle

Grab a lance and sing your way over to Sepia Saturday for more interpretations of this week's theme.