My desecent took place at nine in the evening on the 27th of May 1947. Mother never said much about it except that it was a "dreamy" experience in which she saw dancing cut-outs or some such. My french aunt, Odile, was a little more explicit: I was thehre when you whehre bohrn!" from which I was left to understand that she was first witness to the event.
One wonders how much of anything a newly born drowned rat senses or knows anything but, throughout my life, I have always felt a close and returning attachment to Odile that was, in a curious way, deeper and quieter than my love for my mother.
1. Mother later said that when father first saw me he exclaimed that i looked like a "drowned rat." She said this in a cheerful tone of voice that expected me to find it amusing. I suppose, it was one of her futile, fantasy attempts to endear me to an unendearing father. But like many of her repainted realities, it was not true in any event. Father was in New York recovering from an eye operation.
Mother also later said that "when your father first saw you, he said...." leaving it somewhat ambiguous as to when "when" was. However, Odile who kept a diary of the events (it would be Odile) has an entry for June 24th stating "Daniel gone." So Daniel did come up to Canada, and did stare at me through pin holes in his darkened lenses; but there was no way he was hanging around in Hawkesbury for a month.
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