Lindsey's Response to Faery's Ella

[Sondra Perl]

#576

Scratch the surface of any family and chances are you would discover concealed stories. We would also find these stories to have alternating beginnings and endings. There are many reasons people and families do not share stories and/or disguise truths, usually there is some component of shame involved. Frequently the concealment of stories is the reaction from a cause considered conflicting to a family’s own central construct. Rebecca Faery’s epic heart-rending chronicle of her Great-Great Grandmother Ella offers the reader an exploration in family dynamics; oral histories potency, omissions or altered particulars and the enduring consequences of such actions.
Faery writes a comprehensive narrative that, at times, reads like fiction. In this condensed tome, Faery provides us with firm defined images and textures of her extended family. She fluently describes her ancestral heritage within a historical context. She digs deeper into the social constructs of the day, by exploring racial prejudices and hidden identities. Her account of the story in question, engages several voices, from her own as a child and as an adult, her mother’s, her grandmother, various aunts, her grandfather, and her great grandfather and of course the voice of Ella. By providing these voices the reader is surrounded by a wide array of scenarios.

Faery offers a nonjudgmental holistic exploration of her great-great grandmother Ella Seagroves’ journey. At times she positioned herself as Ella in the hopes of understanding her as a woman within that time and place. Her probes allow Faery to provide evidence that may offer insight as to Ella’s reasoning for her life choices.

Faery’s story, as with Pinard’s essay, echoed with me because of early mother loss and its implications. It’s been my experience that early parental loss has lifelong ramifications, as we see in the story by Pinard, who was still in the process of unraveling her loss in her forties (as am I) and in Faery’s essay observing her “Pop” experiencing the same emotional turmoil, several decades after the initial loss.

While Faery may never uncover the truth of Ella, what she does accomplish is more important, she uncovered Ella. As a writer she allowed Ella to be heard, she bears witness to a life that once was and is still very much a part of her family and herself.

[Website Services Admin]

#596

Lindsey, it seems like you connected with this story more, although you mention your direct connection in terms of experience to the other story. What do you think it is about this story that connects you to it? I also love this story, definitely more than the Pinard story, but I think it’s because this story speaks to my academic writing goals. The loss of the mother is so potent in this story – it isn’t just Pop who loses his mother when she walks out, Will also had to grow up without a mother, and then a father and lived a hard life because of it.

[Sondra Perl]

#603

Daimys,

Yes! The loss effected the immediate family and the generations to follow. Makes you wonder…..”what if”…what if she didn’t abandon her son? How would that have effected the family?

[Author]

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