Little Louise . . .

Mon, December 24, 2012 3:40:22 PM

 

From: Marie Brennan (Ray and Henriette's oldest child.) I've forwarded the photos to Marie. Irene

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THE GREEN ORGANDY DRESS

I was three years old. My Mama and Daddy, Alice, Joe, and I lived in a basement apartment next door to our Memere and Pepere, our mother's parents. I didn't like to play outside alone, and my mother used to make me. My Dad made a play yard for us from metal fencing. It had an expandable lattice work wooden gate that had a metal clip to keep it closed so we didn't go into the road. My fingers were too weak to open it. I know because I tried a lot, and I cried a lot trying to get out. I didn't want to go into the road, I wanted back inside the house, or to go to my Memere's house, although during the week she was usually working. Both Memere and Pepere worked in a mill that made cloth. I wanted adult company, and I demanded it, in various annoying and socially unacceptable ways.
Sometimes my sister Alice would play outside with me, but at that time she liked more to copy what I was doing instead of really interacting with me, and her language wasn't very clear yet, so after a while she was kind of boring. So I spent most of my outside time whining, crying, and making bubbles with spit as I cried. Probably I whacked Alice once in a while, just to get my mama involved. My brother Joe was too little to play with and I wasn't allowed to carry him around. I could have picked up my sister Alice, but she didn't like it and she would scrunch down with all of her weight so I couldn't lift her. I got tired of being the big sister, because at that time everyone was smaller and cuter, and if there wasn't enough of something to go around, I had to go without because I was the oldest, and because I understood. My language was very well developed, and I could carry on a decent conversation with almost anyone who wanted to talk. Of course my topics of conversation were probably boring for the adults in my life at the time, and I'm sure they needed a break from me, just as I needed a break from my siblings. It was tough being three.
Anyway, I remember the day I first heard the word “organdy” and saw the beautiful fabric that it is. It was some type of vacation day. I'm not sure if it was Summer or Fall. I think it was Summer because we didn't need sweaters to play outside, but it was possibly late Summer because my aunt Rose's honeysuckle bush had red berries all over it. Our cousins, Pauline, Irene, Rosette, and little Louise, came over to play with us. They were the children of our Memere's baby brother, our uncle, Louis Caron, and his wife, our aunt, Dolores. They are our second cousins. I think they called Rose, “Rosette” so as not to confuse her with our Aunt Rose who was Memere's sister. Louise was called little Louise. I'm not sure if there was another relative named Louise, or if it was just because she was little. I was called “little Marie” and I called myself that most of the time, as if I was talking about someone else. I thought of myself in the third person. I didn't think of myself as “I” until I was about five years old.
Anyway back to the story, I think Pauline went back over to Aunt Rose's house after a little while, but Irene, Rosette, and little Louise stayed. We had to stay in the yard but the gate could be opened because Irene and Rose were older and they could watch us. Little Louise was younger than Alice, but older than Joe. She was about 2, I think. I was used to Rosette and Irene, but I hadn't had a chance to play with Louise ever, probably because she was too little. She had honey blond hair, and blue eyes. Her hair was in three pony tails, one on each side and one on the top and off to the side. Each ponytail was curled in a single long curl and was tied with a white satin ribbon. She wore a beautiful light green organdy dress, the translucent color of a grasshopper wing. That was the first time I had heard the word “organdy.” I liked the sound of it and the crinkly feel of little Louise's dress. She also wore a white pinafore apron with ruffled sleeves. Anyway I thought she was very cute and sweet. She was little enough that I could easily lift her, and during the time we played I carried her around a lot, and when I did, I was told to put her down because she and I might get hurt, and I was told not to be too rough. I was careful.
We played circle games, “Ring Around The Rosie,” “Motorboat,” “Little Sally Saucer,” “Here Comes The Bluebird,” and the “Farmer In The Dell”. It was a wonderful happy day. Later we all went to Aunt Rose's house in the evening for a cookout, I think. We played and played. Some of the boys spit the honeysuckle berries at each other. We were told not to eat them because they were poisonous. We chased each other around the honeysuckle bush and we had lots of fun. Little Louise was right there in the middle of the fun. She laughed and played and had a wonderful day. Her mother and father were constantly warning us not to be too rough and to be gentle with her. Her dress and pinafore got dirty with all of the playing. It was getting dark by the time we all left Aunt Rose's house and went home.
The next day when we woke up our parents were crying. I had never seen my Dad cry and I was very worried. Our parents told us that the night before, little Louise had a high fever, and a convulsion, and she died. They said Uncle Louis tried to cool her off from the fever by running cold water on her but it didn't work and she died anyway.
My sister Alice and I went to the wake and the funeral. At the wake little Louise looked like she was asleep. She was wearing the green organdy dress and the white pinafore, all clean and lovely again. She had the three ponytails and the white satin ribbons in her hair. She was beautiful. I touched her knee and she was cold. Someone told me “This isn't little Louise, it's just her body. She is up in Heaven with Jesus.” I tried but I didn't really understand. I didn't know to cry and feel sad. I thought she would wake up after a while, but Mama said that wouldn't happen.
My sister, Alice, picked a gladiola from a flower basket at the wake. She curled up on the kneeler near the casket, brushed the flower on her cheek, and sucked her thumb. Everyone thought she was very cute, and it helped people laugh a little through their tears. At the funeral the next day, there was a “Mass of the Angels” Alice and Joe and I sat with Memere and Pepere and Mama and Daddy. I asked Memere why there was an ironing board in church but she just gave me a look and didn't answer. I think now it must have been the coffin. It was small and white. I don't remember the grave side service at all. Maybe we didn't go, or maybe I just didn't understand it at all and so I've forgotten it.
I did worry that maybe I had picked little Louise up too much and that's why she got sick, but Mama said that wasn't the reason. I also thought that maybe she ate some of the honeysuckle berries. I looked them up on the internet recently and there is no record of any human death from eating them. I think her family thought it might have been polio that caused the high fever, and that could be, because polio was a terrible sickness among the children of the 1950's, and it was often fatal.
Alice and I played funeral a lot after that, every time we pretended with our dolls, until Mama made us stop it.
Little Louise didn't ever come back, of course, but the day we spent with her lingers in my memory as if it happened yesterday, and I am 62 years old. I'm glad God gave us that day.
When I was five years old, my memere made me a white organdy dress to wear in a procession in the Catholic church on Holy Thursday. On that day and any other day I wore that dress, I thought of little Louise. I think of her every time I see honeysuckle flowers or berries and any time I play circle games. Lately I think of her daily. Heaven seems more real to me because of little Louise, and the rest of our family who are there waiting, and I believe, praying for us.
My mother was pregnant soon after little Louise died, when my sister was born, my parents named her Louise, and asked uncle Louis and aunt Dolores to be her God-parents. My sister Louise was blonde and pretty as a child, like little Louise, and she was a great help to uncle Louis and Aunt Dolores when they got older and needed help. She got to know them very well, and she got to know our cousins and was able to be a blessing and a comfort.
My sister Louise told me there are no pictures of little Louise but I think I remember what she looked like, and I will always carry the memory. Over the years the experience of losing our little cousin helped me know life is fragile. Everything can change in an instant. We need to enjoy and love each other while we can.