Septuagenarian Sisters

Those of you who follow my journey know I am not good at portraiture but today it had to be! Today was a special day, a milestone, a Birthday. Like a spookily high number of people in our immediate and extended family my mum and my aunt are twins and today they turned 70.

Two lives, two individuals but an inextricable bond, one that only twins seem to share, Save for several years when my aunt and her family lived in Paris the sisters have both lived in our little village never far from one another. When I was a child my aunt lived a mere 4 houses along the road and so may people in our little village still think my cousin and I are brother and sister and not cousins, even some people we have known all our life.

I was thinking this afternoon what the twins must have seen in their 70 years, I wondered if they had kept diaries but I am fairly certain they havent. What reading it would have made, born in the later years of a world war, growing up with rationing, in a time of steam trains, few cars, freedom to play from dawn until dusk not to mention the events of history, from Kennedy's assassination to Woodstock, The Civil Rights Movement to Women's Lib, Man on the moon, Television I could go on an on. I have always had and even still enjoy anonymity in our little village, I was referred to by old villagers as Billy McKee's grandson, or his mum's a McKee twin. I am now the twins dad, I kind of like that sense of being in the background.

It is sad sometimes when people remind you of events from their diary, a little bit of shared history, events from so long ago but nonetheless events that potentially changed the course of their life and yours that seemed at the time to be innocuous but in hindsight maybe one of life's great mistakes. Where might we have been, how different our lives might have been. Those pages will always read the same but life has a habit of coming full circle and whilst the past cannot and should not be re-written the future is ours to enjoy to the fullest and enjoy we must for life is not a dress rehearsal.

I suppose Blip during this past year has been like a diary for me, sharing my journey with those of you who choose to enjoy it with me, sometimes personal sometimes random, but always meaningful to me, the love, the loss, the achievement, the fear, the joy and the sadness, I am looking forward to reading the journal at the end of the 365 to relive the highs and lows of this last passing year.

My aunt is in the foreground, my mum tucked in behind her in the background, sisters, twins, but two very individual people whose paths took very different courses over their 70 years. No story or words of wisdom today just a family snap, an indulgence capturing a little piece of our family history for posterity. I hope you can enjoy the laughter they shared this afternoon, a fit of the giggles as I tried in vain to get them to sit still and behave!!!! Sadly they carried on regardless so the result is not well framed nor well lit so monochrome won out but is does capture the essence of the twins and that makes me smile