傑奎琳·希奇/Jacqueline Hickey
When my grandfather died, my 83-year-old grandmother, once full of life, slowly began to fade. No longer able to manage a home of her own, she moved in with my mother, where she was visited often by other members of her large, loving family (two children, eight grandchildren, 22 great-grandchildren and two great-greatgrandchildren). Although she still had her good days, it was often hard to arouse her interest.
One chilly December afternoon three years ago, my daughter Meagan, then eight, and I were settling in for a long visit with“GG,”as the family calls her, when she noticed that Meagan was carrying her favorite doll.
“I, too, had a special doll when I was a little girl,”she told a wide- eyed Meagan,“I got it one Christmas when I was about your age. I lived in an old farmhouse in Maine, with Mom, Dad and my four sisters, and the very first gift I opened that Christmas was the most beautiful doll you’d ever want to see.”
“She had an exquisite, hand-painted porcelain face, and her long brown hair was pulled back with a big pink bow. Her eyes were blue as blue could be, and they opened and closed. I remember she had a body of kidskin, and her arms and legs bent at the joints.”
GG’s voice dropped low, taking on an almost reverent tone.“My doll was dressed in a dainty pink gown, trimmed with fine lace. But what I especially remember was her petticoat. It was fine batiste, trimmed with rows and rows of delicate lace. And the tiny buttons on her boots were real. Getting such a fine doll was like a miracle for a little farm girl like me—my parents must have had to sacrifice so much to afford it. But how happy I was that morning!”
GG’s eyes filled and her voice shook with emotion as she recalled that Christmas of long ago.“I played with my doll all morning long. She was such a beautiful dol…… And then it happened. My mother called us to the dining room for Christmas dinner and I laid my new doll down, ever so gently, on the hall table. But as I went to join the family at the table, I heard a loud crash.”