Narrative 9

The marriage of M. with L.
I remember the wedding of M. and L. when I was a teenager. I was told that I served Mass during the marriage, but I don’t remember at all. In fact, what I remember is a very traumatic time after the wedding, right before the banquet...

Just before the guests came down to the reception hall in the basement of the church, my sister and I were already there alone, expecting Mom to join us shortly.

Instead a relative of L. arrived and suddenly was very aggressive towards us shouting and screaming. For no reason at all! I still remember the intense fear that gripped me all over my body. (Thirty years later my sister and I still have shivers when we look back ...) We then went outside trembling from head to toes.

When Mom arrived we watched her go into the reception hall alone to face the weirdo. I was fearful for her. But in my heart I knew Mom would save and protect us...

I'd never been aware until now of all the self-assuredness I saw in Mom. Because I knew deep down that she would never be afraid to stand up for me no matter what. She gave me a great proof of her love then. Which I never realized...

Narrative 8:

The field behind the house:

I remember being young there was behind our house a huge field of perhaps half a mile long until a dense forest not really inviting.

I played very often in this field. Alone, with friends or with my sister M. There’s a picture of her with Grandma G. immortalized standing in this large field with grass up to his thighs for my grandmother, to the neck for my sister.

I loved walking in this field.

I loved running in this field.

Sometimes I lay in the grass and watched the sky. Sometimes, after the rain, when there was a rainbow in the sky, I ran with a friend to reach it and we would go so near the end of the field, very close to the dense forest. I then turned back walking backwards to avoid having my back to the forest.

I always had a great sense of freedom in this field, like in a movie cliché or in a novel’s stereotype.

Nothing untoward happened in this field filled with ordinary grass, wild flowers and fireflies some summer evenings.

In the morning when I looked out the kitchen window, I embraced it. At night just before the darkness, I threw a last glance of tenderness and a desire to join it.

I liked this field as one loves a person.

Thank you my friend...

Narrative 3

I remember after my Saturday evening big weekly bath, my mother making me an neapolitan ice cream cone and then going to the living room watching Thierry la Fronde (The King's Outlaw) and then Hockey Night, with dad in his armchair and mom on the sofa and me right in front of the TV, sitting on the cold floor.

I was three.

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I remember having a terrible fit because my parents went out to the movies, a weekend, and hitting with all my strengths my red plastic boat on the front door, and shouting, howling, crying to show my anger in front of my babysitter totally helpless. Suddenly, I stopped everything and I noticed dozens of red marks which I had made on the door and then I was afraid I’ll be punished.

I was around two.

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I remember vaguely my little sister sleeping in her crib in my parents’ bedroom.

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I remember being five when I heard that our neighbor, Mrs. Tardy, woke up one morning and her husband, sleeping next to her, was dead. Not knowing it, she slept with a dead body next to her all night. This really traumatized me, upset me. A lot. I don’t know why…