Michael & Margaret were very rarely separated in the time they had together. Nevertheless in the times they were apart they wrote voraciously and were both peripatetic diarists. I have always been fascinated with my families heritage and the events that transpired to create my brother and me, and they have encouraged me by letting me read their love letters and poetry. I have pulled together a few thoughts from those exchanges partly to reflect my father's roving interests from mosquitoes to shakespeare. But mostly so that you can share with my family the love we had and the loss we all feel.
1972
I am tackling work with a fresh spirit . . . Mark Doughty (Chairman) told me today there seems to be a chance that I would be put on a university contract next year (72-73) which would solve all our problems.
May 6, 1967 (two months after I was concieved) from my Mother's diery
Michael and I are talking about Leillard de Chardin. He says. "Throughout the world at this moment, without distinction of country, class, calling, or creed, men are appearing who have begon to reason, to act and to pray in terms of the limitless and organic dimensions of space-time (Our idea of love. MGH/MS). To the outside observer such men may seem isolated But they are aware of one another among themselves, they recognize each other whenever their paths cross. They know that tomorow, rejecting old concepts, divisions and forms, the world will see what they see and think as they do" What beutifuf, true, encouraging words, what this world needs is more Michael's
September 21, 1971
Mother and Dad have fallen for Montreal. They walk every where and are impressed by how clean the city is and all our shopping centers
I miss you and I miss Mark and Keith. When I am caught up in the busy-ness, the pain is dulled to a constant ache. But when I relax, the comming time looms up like a prison sentence with no reprive or time off for good behaivior.
October 19, 1970 From mass spectrometers to N.M.R.
We had Jack Miller to dinner and discussed all the world's problems all the way from mass spectrometers to N.M.R.. The Laporte affair is of course horific, while about the establishment's backlash . . However it makes me all the more anxious to get back to Quebec.
1970 Form my mother to my father
I watch you
Watch
Our Sons
And that
My love's
A poem
In itself
October 15, 1971
Looking forward to Sunday afternoon when I'm invited out to a prof's Pallen's (2 kids 14 & 12) on the Lakeshore (Beacons field)
April 11, 1972
Wish you were here ("Right now!" as the kids say) I see now why you like rings, mine is a constant reminder of you. I really like it and starting tonight, I will wear it 24 hrs a day. Almost as difficult as contact lenses.
April 14, 1972
I am as happy as I can be considering I am 350 miles away from my loved ones and my beloved Kipawa. When you take away you, the kids and Kipawa, there's not much life for me to emotionally live on. Chemistry doesn't fill the void even partially, but the students and montreal are exciting and do make the world an easier place to live.
September 22, 1971
I have been reading Shakepeare's sonnets and I am attracted to this one - I don't know wwhy. THere are others probably more suitable but I'm amused at the comparison of Ford Falcon and the beast and when I drive on to Montreal I'm conscious all the time that I'm putting mile after mile between me and all that I am conscious of getting closer and closer to you
Sonnet:
How heavy as I journey on the way
When what I seek - my weary travels and
doth teach that ease and that repose to say
"Thus far the miles are measured from my friend"
the beast that bears me tired with my woe
plods dully on to bear thqat weight in me
as if by soone instinct the wretch did know
his rider loved not speed, being made from thee.
his bloody spur cannot provoke him on
that sometimes anger thursts into his ride
which heavilly he answers with a groan
More sharp to me than spurring to his side.
For that same groan doth put this in my mind
my grief lies onward and my joy behind.
July 3, 72
Make sure whoever gets the moy order to ------ doesn't for get the bank to give us the dicount of one and a half percent and not the other way around which is what they tried to pull last month- it would be interesting to parse the preceding sentence!!
????
I was just thinking as I came to work hard really fantastic and lucky that we were able to spend 2 full years so close together for upwards of 15 hours a day (London & Grimsby). Those were the days I went in ... after we had spent the mornings and afternoons talking, localising and arguing. I doubt if we will ever again be so physically together.... maybe that's what retirement is like - if so, I am really happy. Roll on 2005 A.D.
One of the nice things about getting back to montreal for a few days is that it allows your mosquito bites to die down
November 13, 1979
You can make your time with each other anything it can be, beutiful or ugly. If you make each other better, then your lavishing of yourself upon the other is exquisite - is secred. If you make each other more evil, then all the propriety of the world cannot justify your ugliness. Destruction is always ugly - wanton destruction is ugly and evil.
March 22, 1982
It's important to take the good things in life and remember them. They always seem to be frozen in some artic abyss..eternally preserved because they're waiting for a thaw that never comes. (re C.S. Lewis). We must take the warmth of our lives ..the times we were loved and held and kissed and occasionnally, for the lucky ones, the times we were worshipped.
May 1964
Death is a constant shadow on my mind impossible to completely erase for even in my keenest joy I find the thought acutely present. Face to face with you, your love, your tenderness, your touch, your life becomes a treasure double dear. I could not part our wills, our souls, if such were planned to be our destiny. For here within your warmth you hold my being fast. Irrevocably, uniquely, singley yours. For I am yours time future and time past. Regardless of the weapons our fate stores. But if through chance death takes you from my side, by that same action then, I shall have died.
February 14, 1992
M.
Happy Valentine
My one and only love
M