'How do you think we look in this, love?': Keeping in touch across the miles.

During the year in which they emigrated from Ireland, my mother and father were separated from each other for seven months, because my father had emigrated from Ireland first, in order to settle into his new job, and find a home for them in Canada.

Although I do not have any of the letters my mother and father sent to each other during those seven months they were apart, within their collection I found some photographs which my mom sent to my dad during that time. It is lovely to read the message on the back of each one, and have this little window into their lives at a time when I was not yet a part of their family.

The message on the back of the photo reads:

To Michael, All My Love, Mary.
How do you think we look in this, love?
The little girl is Michael's pal.  xx

The message on the back of the photo reads:

Kay and Michael.
To you Daddy with love from Junior xx
Avoca June 24th 1956.

The message on the back of the photo reads:

Kay, her boyfriend Eamonn, Jerry and I, and Junior on Kay's knee
with love
Avoca June 24th 1956

Unfortunately, I do not know the identity of the little girl who was my brother Michael's pal. Since Michael was named after our father, he was sometimes called Junior, thus the salutation 'from Junior'. Kay is Kathleen Ball, one of my mother's sisters, and Jerry is Gerard Ball, one of her brothers.

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