All right, I admit
it, my family has it's closets full of skeletons like every body
else and my aunt Kathleen, pictured here with her cousin Louis,
is one of them. Kathleen was my mothers' older sister and until
I was around six we, my parents and my sister, my grand mother and
Kathleen, lived together in Leicester. In 1954 my grand mother died
and my mum, sister, aunt and my self moved to London. My father
was working away at the time. We did not find the streets of the
capital "paved with gold" and so we all came back to Leicester.
This is where it all gets a bit blurred. I don't remember Kathleen
coming back with us but my cousin Annette, with whom we went to stay
for a while when we got back, says that she remembers Kathleen coming
back to Leicester. In any event I honestly remember nothing more
of my Aunt until a weird memory I have of when I was around fourteen,
when my mum was summoned to London where her sister was very ill.
Maybe I didn't ask but I don't remember my mum saying that much
when she came back.. I have my own theories about what happened
with Kathleen and it is these theories that I have issues around.
I believe that Kathleen became some kind of homeless person, a bag
lady but I really don't know. If she did and if she died homeless
and unloved then that would be a tragedy but some thing that would
at least give a sense of closure |