The bread box is the only visible reminder that remains of her mother. With fading blue paint and the word ‘Bread’ in slightly crooked white letters across the front, it sits on the counter in expectation of the hands that crafted it. Only, they never come. They are floating somewhere in the sea of white, just beyond the pane of glass that separates heaven from earth, from what can be seen and heard from the unimaginable.
As she looks out into the wind and snow and the trees barely visible behind the white curtain of the storm, Mary Sarah is reminded of all the mornings, so much like this one, spent over breakfasts of toasted homemade bread and whatever jam was opened. As the wind tore in from the ocean, gathering strength and speed as it flew across the endless expanse of ice that merged into the horizon, they would sit at the table in their tiny kitchen, gathering warmth from the wood-stove, sipping hot tea and not speaking. They would bask in the silence that is only possible when two people are so connected that words lose their meaning and speech becomes unnecessary. The house would creak and groan as the wind hurled itself over and around where it had stood for generations, and yet the stillness of mother and child remained undisturbed.
Sometimes the radio would play one hundred year old fiddle tunes in between news of road conditions and school cancellations. Mary Sarah would wait in fervent expectation to hear that the school would be closed for the day, so she would not have to venture out with her father in their ancient tractor. Instead, she and her mother would plan a day of making bread and braiding rugs from old wool coats still hanging in the porch. Whatever time was left would be spent around the farm at her father’s side, repairing damage caused by the storm to fences and barn doors ripped off their hinges by the angry, sea-formed wind.
Her mother would sit with her prayer book until the day’s offerings had been made, then move to whatever task needed to be done. It may be putting the final touches on a quilt or knitting another pair of wool socks to keep her husband’s feet warm as he tramped over frozen fields to attend to whatever chore demanded of him that day. If there was school, she would give her daughter an apologetic smile and reach over and pat her hand to remind her to get going. Mary Sarah would reluctantly prepare for the ride with her father in their ancient tractor. He would drive her through the depths of snow along the long back road that connected them to the main street of their tiny village. With no heater, the ride would be long and cold and uncomfortable. Her father would drill her on the details of the MacMorrill family history. His people were of the first to settle their tiny coastal community, something that he made sure Mary Sarah did not forget. For him, there was nothing as important as knowing where one belonged.
As the tractor rambled awkwardly over drifts and icy potholes beneath the snow’s surface, he would recite the Lord’s Prayer in Gaelic and have her repeat it, interrupting her whenever she was off in her pronunciation. If there was time, they would sing one of the many sweet sounding songs, in the language of their ancestors, that he had taught her in her infancy. The sound of her soft soprano over her father’s deep baritone almost made up for the fact that soon she would be at school, where she did not have many friends and couldn’t wait for the day to end so she could return home.
But things are different now.
There are no quiet breakfasts of homemade bread and jam on stormy winter mornings.
No more heritage lessons and harmonies over the roar of the tractor as it plows through snow covering the road on which they live.
Her father has lost interest in everything, including her
Mary Sarah watches the snow swirl into angel-like creatures that hover in stillness for the briefest of moments until being swept away into nothingness by a sudden surge of wind. For an instant, she imagines herself being carried away to wherever heaven must surely exist, and where her mother now dwells. Mary Sarah is standing in the exact spot she was when she died, when a blood vessel in her brain suddenly burst and she was gone before she even hit the floor. It happened one afternoon in the early days of September. While she had been in school, her father had been finishing up the last load of hay with a few neighbouring farmers. They came in expecting to find her mother’s gentle smile and homemade soup, but were met with her lifeless body instead. At least, that’s how Mary Sarah thinks it went. No one would tell her. Certainly not her father, who retreated to a state of alcoholic depression before the coffin was even in the ground.
She had pieced together the story from bits of conversations she had heard between adults, at the parish hall after the funeral mass and then at their house when a few relatives and close friends had returned with them and stayed well into the night. Mary Sarah could not remember another time when their tiny kitchen had seen so many guests at once. A quiet couple, her parents rarely had people over, preferring to keep to themselves. They were an older pair who had married late in life and were not expecting to have any children until Mary Sarah happened.
And so it had always been just the three of them, belonging to each other and to their home.
She hears him cough from the next room. It is morning, but he will not move until well into the afternoon. Or so she assumes. When he wakes, he will reach for the bottle that sits half empty beside the faded chesterfield where he lays and slowly raise the bottom until the remains have trickled down his all too welcoming throat. Once, he spent a full two days just lying there, staring at the ceiling. Not knowing what else to do she laid down on the floor beside him, looking upwards and wondering what it was that held his stare. Maybe he too was wondering about heaven and where it had taken her. Was she there, hovering over them with them with her delicate smile? Could he see her? Is that why his eyes never shifted to look at his daughter, who was still living and unsure of where she now belongs?
Today, there will be no school. The radio tells her to be advised of the treacherous road conditions and lack of visibility. The storm is worsening now, the wind is hurling itself over the great expanse of the Atlantic , coming towards them at a ferocious speed. Though she would rather stay in and curl up with one of her mother’s favourite books away from where her father attempts to sleep off yet another losing battle with the drink, their very survival demands that she venture outside and tend to their herd of beef cattle that, come spring, will supply enough income to see them through another year’s worth of seasons.
As Mary Sarah prepares for the onslaught of cold and wind that will meet her as soon as she opens the door, she is once again reminded of how things have changed since her mother’s untimely death. Her father never missed a day in the barn, never neglected his herd and certainly never expected his eleven year old daughter to look out for signs of shipping fever and black leg. He was a tower of strength, with broad shoulders that have withstood decades of hard physical labour. Standing over six feet tall, he could unroot a fence post with one hand and lead an obstinate steer onto a cattle truck as if it was a dutiful and willing puppy dog.
Wishing she had even a little bit of her father’s physical prowess, Mary Sarah steps outside. Just as she anticipated, she is met with blinding snow caught up in an icy wind that renders her breathless. The door, with its handle still in her hand, is taken by the force of the storm and in one fluid motion pulls Mary Sarah with it, slamming against the side of the house. It takes all of her strength to pull it closed again.
She steadies herself against the wind as she begins the short walk to the cattle barn. Since it is coming from the direction of the sea, which is located just beyond the back side of the house, it soon sends Mary Sarah running as it pushes violently against her back.
Arms flailing, Mary Sarah is propelled straight ahead to the side of the barn. Her arms reach out to slide the bock of wood that keeps the door closed ahead so that she can pull the awkward plywood door towards her just enough to slip inside. If she had looked back from whence she came before accepting the safety that the barn offered, Mary Sarah would have been dismayed to realize that the house is no longer visible against the been descending upon them.
Once inside, Mary Sarah is overcome by an expected draft of bitterly cold air. Scanning the walls of the barn she soon discovers that one of the double doors that face the north end has been ripped away from the force of the wind. Most of the animals have congregated in the opposite corner of the pen, relying on each other for warmth against the cold cruelty of the weather. Unwilling to risk the chance of losing any of the herd to the elements, she must think quickly to solve the problem of the open door, before the animals become spooked by the wind and decide to bolt.
With the agility of a cat she jumps over the metal rods that stretch from one end of the pen to the other.
The manure is piled high as her father has ignored the need to scrape the floor’s surface on a regular basis. Trudging through it is not nearly as difficult as fighting the raging storm happening beyond the safety of the barn’s structure, though, and she welcomes the break. Petite like her mother, Mary Sarah is not built for such strenuous labour but ignores the warnings of her heaving chest. The risk of losing animals to the storm is too high. She will have to go back outside and search for something to use to block the open doorway.
This time, though, she is prepared for the force of what she will face and braces her small body for the onslaught of snow and wind and rain that will attempt to overpower her. If she can get around to the other side of the barn she can drag one of the old water barrels and use it to fool the herd into thinking the passageway
is blocked. Should they get spooked and run, they will assume that the way outside is unclear and simply circle back into the barn.
When she steps back outside and begins to make her way to where she knows the barrel stands, something in the distance catches her attention. In the brief moments when the wind is not quite as fierce and the snow not as blinding, her eyes are drawn to a heap lying on the ground. Every so often, there is a slight movement and Mary Sarah knows it can only be one thing.
Unaware of the danger caused by the blinding gust of snow that intermittently rips its way across the field where the cow lay, Mary Sarah lets go of the barn and attempts to make her way towards the shadowlike form that is slowly being covered. This time, her body must fight the oncoming wind that is determined to send her back for each progressing step she makes.
When she reaches her destination Mary Sarah, with a sinking stomach, realizes she is indeed right. The cow had escaped through the opened doorway and, from the shock of what met her when she reached the open field, was sent into labour. Falling to her knees, Mary Sarah makes her way to the back end of the suffering animal, using her hands to feel for the calf. Relief floods over her as she is able to grab a hold of the front hooves, which tells her at least it is facing the right way. The mother’s breath, though, is coming slower and slower. If the calf is not born soon both mother and child will be lost.
Wishing she had paid more attention during other births on the farm Mary Sarah resigns herself to the fact that she is all alone and responsible for bringing this life into the world, regardless of the turmoil that surrounds them at the moment. Moving to a sitting position, she uses her weight as leverage to pull the calf all the way out of its mother, surprised at the ease at which it comes closer to her with every pull.
She knows, though, that the exposure to such extreme conditions will surely continue to threaten the calf’s life once it is fully born. What’s more, its mother will have to be coaxed to a standing position and led back to the barn to nurse its offspring if there is to be any hope of its survival. How she will do this Mary Sarah does not know, but there is no time to think for the calf is almost completely exposed. One final pull and…
There!
Exhausted, Mary Sarah falls backwards with the newborn still in her arms. Suddenly she is aware that they are lying on a frozen field in a heap of snow that is being fired at them with tremendous force as the wind refuses to die down. She can feel the calf’s wet fur quickly turning to ice, and knows she must get up and get them both to the safety of the barn or they will surely perish.
Her strength escapes her and she is tempted to simply lie there and let the storm pass over them, ignoring the danger this decision would surely bring. She imagines her mother leaving this earth and entering heaven with all the other angels and saints, her new place of belonging. For the briefest of moments, she thinks she sees her, with her sweet, serene smile and waves of red hair, streaked with gray, framing her face. With her eyes closed, Mary Sarah begins to recite the Our Father in Gaelic, just as her father taught her, hoping for some kind of miracle in this sea of icy emptiness created by Mother Nature.
Just as she begins to feel herself drifting into sleep, Mary Sarah is
lifted from the ground and carried away. Against the wind and passed angels of snow, the strength of his imposing strides is no match for the wrath of the storm. Once inside, he lays her on the faded chesterfield and disappears into the whiteness that has suddenly become unearthly.
When he returns, he is her father once more.
“Mother and child are fine”, he whispers. “Go back to sleep”.
And proceeds to sing her a song in the old language as sleep finally overcomes her.
They are back to where they belong. Father, Mother and Child.
