“…the grandmother had on a navy blue straw sailor hat with a bunch of white violets on the brim ad a navy blue dress with a small white dot in the print. Her collars and cuffs were white organdy trimmed with lace and at her neckline she had pinned a purple spray of cloth violets containing a sachet. In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady.”
The burning sun beat down on the brown grass. The girl climbed the towering tree, clinging to nooks and crannies in the rough trunk. The mother stormed outside, yelling for the daughter to come down, in the most lady-like way one could manage. How could she even consider about doing such a humiliating activity? This was life of a boy, not a thirteen year-old girl. She was almost a lady now. She must learn elegance and grace, sophistication and poise.
The letter came in the mail the 5 years later. She was to go to university, and become a writer. Yet every day she ran through the vast fields, relishing the feeling of elation and freedom. She wanted to be an agricultural worker, so every moment would be spent outside with the swaying grasses surrounding her, and blue sky above her. But the work was menial, that was what she was told. She was worth more than that. No, she would go to university. The girl said no, no all she wanted was to be outside. The next day her father died. Overwhelmed with grief, the mother blamed her daughter, insisting it was all her fault. And so the girl made a promise, that she would always, always be a lady. Till the day she died.
That was 60 years ago.
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