sylvia

Writing about my mother's father yesterday made me think about my father's mother, who I never knew, as she died when I was a toddler. I've been told many times that I resemble her more than anyone else in the family, though I have my grandfather George's height and colouring. I am definitely a product of this genetic line.

Sylvia was even more nomadic than my maternal grandfather, and I understand both their desires to "move on" in an effort to outrun their demons. She was also born in London, and emigrated to Canada (Winnipeg) with her family when she was in her teens. It was there she met George, a first-generation Canadian and by all accounts a cad and a narcissist (I only ever met him twice). They married and had three children, and when my father was a baby George abandoned the family. Thus began the nomadic life of the restless spirit, except she managed to do it with three children in tow. My father spent his childhood in Winnipeg, London, Montreal, Vancouver and Victoria. And more than once in a couple of those cities. During the early part of WWII, when they were in England, Sylvia met and married a Royal Navy officer. I don't know if they ever actuallly lived together as before long, a pregnant Sylvia and her three teenage children were on a ship and heading back to Canada, in a fleet that was torpedoed.

My uncle was born back in Canada. Later that year his older sister, my aunt, gave birth to her first child. Sylvia eventually settled in Victoria, and died before her time. I've always considered Sylvia's daughter, my only aunt of whom I'm inordinately fond, my connection to her.