-NEW WRITER-
LAURA M. NICHOLSON
THE BOOKS
Signifying Nothing
My mother loves fresh starts.
New sheets with bright floral patterns that make me dizzy and nauseated are a fresh start. “Look at these!” she exclaims as the sheets billow out over my bed, “Don’t they make you think of spring?”
Actually, they make me think of funeral flowers, but for once I am wise and hold my thoughts inside. Sometimes I can do this, even when they fester and bubble in my gut until I feel pain in my abdomen. Pain is good. It makes me feel a little more alive than I usually do. I tried to explain that once to my mother, when she was moderately sober, to which she replied, “What sixteen-year old needs pain? Get outside and get fresh air Josephine.” Fresh air, fresh starts, fresh drinks. Everything is fresh to my mother.
Fresh starts also include haircuts, for some reason. Mom drags me out of funeral flowers insisting all I need is “a haircut! That’s what will give you a fresh start!” and she is enthusiastically throwing clothes at me, muttering how this colour goes with this skirt. I think it’s perfectly acceptable to go out in my pajamas.
Far From The Tree
Far from the Tree is the story of three generations of Canadian women, beginning with Elizabeth, a young dreamer during the First World War who is taught strict values from her Nana, a Scottish immigrant widow who is raising her with a disinterested father. Elizabeth grows through her experiences of the War, to finally womanhood, marriage and motherhood.
The story weaves in Elizabeth’s daughter’s perspective, Charlotte, who is a child of the Depression, and a woman during the Second World War. Just as Canadian society changes the country, so too does Charlotte change from the mores taught to her from her mother, Elizabeth. Charlotte, like Canada, becomes autonomous from her family and creates her own, with disastrous results.
Woven next, is Charlotte’s daughter Julia’s perspective. Julia is the modern daughter born in the baby boom era, and through the feminist movement to finally prove that from the tree, that was planted once Nana immigrated to Canada, a third generation Canadian, Julia is the goal realized, a strong Canadian woman, who embodies our society.
Matters of the Heart
How sad is this? Jasmine muses as she tilts her wine glass to her lips to empty the contents. Here she is at a wedding, which she normally loves (good friends, food, wine and dancing), especially when it’s dear friends (and even Ian is a dear friend now that he finally married Wanda), and she’s stuck with Charles as a date.
Charles!
Charles, who is currently sitting beside her, his wine glass still full, with his forefinger trailing the lip of it, not daring to take more than a few sips - he is wearing his suit that she helped picked out for him, so it’s not like she’s embarrassed to be seen with him - and certainly not daring to ask her to dance!