Great Aunt Esther
Esther, my great-aunt, traveled the world in her lifetime. Quite a remarkable achievement, when one considers the time and place into which she was born. Then again, America at the dawn of the 20th century held a few opportunities for a spirited young woman. Esther was nothing if not spirited.
One of four sisters, she never married. Instead, she worked along with assorted relatives at the family business, an electrical supply company. The generosity of her adoring older brother Morris — my grandfather — also helped fund her wanderlust.
A regal woman, Esther was handsome rather than beautiful. Nonetheless, she was attractive to an assortment of men. Grandpa seemed to believe she’d had dozens of affairs. Not that he shared that particular tidbit with me. I only became privy to the stories about Aunt Esther when I reached a certain age. One great tale put Esther in the Yukon in the arms of the poet, Robert Service. Another involved a dashing Mexican, or perhaps it was a Spanish aristocrat. I heard she’d taken up with a Parisian roué, an Italian playboy and an American outlaw. I didn’t believe most of these stories. I didn’t need to. My adolescent imagination glommed onto the romance of it all. From the time I was eight years old, I begged Mother to let me travel with Esther. When you’re older, she always told me.
I never got the chance. Esther died just after my fourteenth birthday.
Our great-aunt always returned with something for my sister and me. She brought the most marvelous gifts: teacups from London, handkerchiefs from Ireland, ceramic bowls from Mexico, scarves from India. For a time, she brought me a doll from every country she visited. I obsessed over my representative collection dressed in saris, serapes, kimonos and kilts. I dreamed of working at the United Nations. I still have the silver bracelet she brought me from Germany on her last trip. She was eighty-four and had been traveling for more than half a century.
For all my good intentions, however, I have turned out not to be as attracted to travel as was my Aunt Esther. I am a vicarious voyager at best. One can point to the increased difficulties placed upon the traveler. The journey is less an adventure these days than an end-run around obstacles to our ultimate destination. Things could change, though. I could change.
Meanwhile, I can close my hand over a tiny silver bracelet that once fit a little girl with big dreams and be transported to an earlier time of steamer trunks, ocean liners and elegant dining cars. I can feel the excitement of alighting in an exotic locale, perhaps in the company of someone like my aunt Esther.
