The old photograph.
My two sisters and me. 8, 7 5 years of age. Yes, that’s our photograph. In black white, grainy with brown edges curdled up by the passage of time. Little by little as the clock ticks we grew apart. Boyfriends became husbands for them. One had children the other did not. I married to and left them. Time passes, ties loosen and those remembered childhood days recede into the tunnel of the past. Yet my brotherly love endures. Until that is, until, it became a sisterly love.
The summer days that year of the photograph were filled with the joys of being with my girlfriend. Little like me, of age 5, she wore a white bow in her blond hair and the prettiest of gossamer dresses. As the summer wore on the rows of potato plants grew and outstretched their leaves toward the blue skies of memory. We would walk among them, row by row holding hands. That old photograph, such happy memories of my first love.
School days came between us and my memory is jogged to a curious event. It is clear, vivid etched in memory. The days when cars of the very rich were invariably black, stupendously large, not a car as we know it today but a magnificent four wheeled carriage. Such a car stopped beside me. Remember this is the old photograph days. I was little, vulnerable. The door opened to reveal a portly gentleman his face deeply creased by time. He wore a top hat. He admirably suited the car. Both being vintage. This gentleman of all things pulled from his pocket, to my absolute delight a small white paper bag. In those days a child would instantly know the bag held boiled sweets. Sold loosely, and dispensed from an array of large glass jars in a “sweet” shop. I held my breath, he sat and tapped his walking stick impatiently. I didn’t step into the car (l now realise to have been a Rolls) as my mum stated never to accept anything from a stranger. I remember being terribly disappointed. l wanted those sweets My mum had instilled in me a fear of strangers. Yet, I thought of myself as being cowardly ..
One day during those old photograph days my father brought home an old alarm clock. From this innocent beginning l was to be discovered. My life long yearning was already in place. Needless to say, l loved bright things, colours, flowers all together these “feminine” traits which were so apparent. My father called me sissy. I suppose l was. So it seemed of much and great importance to have my hair cut to as short as possible. This upset me greatly yet my father, it seemed to satisfy him a great deal. I digress, you see the alarm clock became mine. I was to contract a life threatening illness from it. It’s former owner suffered from Scarlet Fever. A very severe disease in those days. I was quickly dispatched by ambulance to an isolation ward at Nottingham City hospital.
My recovery was long, painful and boring. That is until the day of my discovery. I simply wanted to dress as a girl. I wanted to be one. I wore my mum’s clothes. I lay for a long time in bed at home wearing her dresses. While still recovering from the illness l was brought to new level of awareness about who l was, what l was meant to be. It frightened me, yet it brought about, years later, the new me.
Yes, the old photograph. It recalls my brotherly love.
That new photograph of the three sisters replacing the old has yet to be made. There is great doubt that it ever will.
Patricia Thompson, Nottinghamshire
FebulousFebruary 2026: The Old Photograph 