Marcella Edmund

*A Personal Note:

      The story begins with my sister, and her best friend Connie. They were friends for three decades, and over the years I was glad to know Connie as my friend as well. She was an artist, always open, and encouraging to others. So she was, to me. She had been to the Arctic on an art teaching expedition, and she strongly encouraged me to consider going up there, to share my art and creative knowledge. At the time, all I could think of was how my work revolves and evolves primarily from the lush, verdant world I live in, in Wisconsin, and I didn’t know how I would relate to such a remote, barren place, while Connie had met the people. I did not pursue the opportunity, and like so many others, live with the wonder and regret of narrowed perameters, rather than the accomplishments of courage and exploration.

      This summer, when I was a few weeks in to the beginning of the igloo box, my sister called me to tell me that Connie had cancer, and had not long to live. She passed away within a month, and I went up to the funeral. I couldn’t imagine the tragedy of losing one’s best friend. It affected me deeply. Work was at a standstill; but that hardly mattered. In the face of Death, what is the point of all our useless, frivolous efforts? The best thing I could do was to be there, embrace my sister, and help her endure, as she saw her friend buried.

      And then I came home, to bury my own best freind, my darling Tessa, the Shetland Sheepdog Contessa Colleen, gone from me within the week. An incredible tragedy, a terrible loss. I put the igloo away.

     Eventually, time passed, and finally one day I brought the work out again. All the while, my subconscious had been mulling the matter, and when the day came, I knew what to do. The hinges were mounted and the supports glued in, hours of staring at the visual challenge brought resolution, and the work went on.

     Now it is done. I have a new dog, Maggie, unexpected and miraculously come in to my life. She has watched me work, with interest. Who knows, where we will go, together. My heart still aches for my sister, for Connie is gone, and there is no reprieve from that sorrow. Dear, glimmering star, beyond us now.

     In the end, in the continuance, these are thoughts for me, and the few who care for the details.  I know that when I look at the igloo, the Starlight Lodge, I will think of these things, these passings, and the whimsey of my creation will be tempered with the pain of loss, the knowing of passing, and the fact that this ephemeral life is like star light, at dawn.