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Show •in my father's'house/351 before the scales of justice were balanced in her favor- I wondered how God would make her absence up to her little children, some of them too young to understand what had happened. Aunt Elsa had already taken them into her home and the little ones were calling her "Momma." AuntRach'el's funeral was perhaps the last occasion for me to wear a long skirt in many years to come. As my skirts became shorter and my make-up more artful, I began to dream more vividly, day and night. While awake, my daydreams would carry me off to the attic room of a house on the Montana ranch. There, I was safe from the city people whose space invaded mine, whose feelings mattered more than mine. There, I was at peace with nature. When I went out of the house, I went walking through cool forests which made lace out of the bluest sky. But mostly, . I sat in my attic room at a desk, writing,. .writing.. .writing. It was never clear what I was writing in the dream, only that I wrote on and on. And when I was finished and the yellow sunlight had begun to cool, I would stand and dress for dinner. Each day I would have a new dress - old-fashioned and girlish with puffed sleeves and long skirts of gingham check - the type of clothing I presumed my father wanted me to wear. One day I would wear yellow, the next day Pink, the next blue. I was always neat and pretty and clean, my face free of make up and my hair long. And I never had boyfriends who wanted to kiss me and touch me. I never had boyfriends at all. Somehow the letters or whatever it was that I wrote all day made up for that. When I descended the stairs for dinner, I imagined that family would be milling around - |