Jane Austen Made Me Do It (18 page)

My imagination has always been full of colorful and detailed
scenarios, many of which I attempted to write for the stage. Alas, the only audience who found my plays fascinating was my family, who participated as actors in the pantomimes I wrote each Christmas. I may not remember the scenes or the lines I wrote, but I remember the laughter we shared when performing them. Sometimes, it's not important for an audience to be educated by a well-structured play; sometimes a play is worth doing just for the fun of it.

I hope you will do many things in your life, not for a particular result, but just for the fun of it.

It was required of me to learn to play the piano, and it's one of the best things I ever did. I am not very good at it, but the hours I spent playing have given me a kind of peace that everyone should experience. The rote scales take me inward, to a very quiet place, and then the mastery of certain selections has given me a sense of accomplishment that I have found rarely elsewhere.

I hope you will fill your home with music.

I have the great privilege of caring for my father in his old age. Many times I have thought this a nuisance, when I would rather be off doing something to my own liking, but have found that honoring and attending to responsibility, even those foisted upon one uninvited, builds character. Often, I force myself to take the drudgery of caring for an older person as a project to complete, overlooking their cranky moods and ornery demands, to attempt to find the good in it, and make it a learning experience.

I hope you and Benjamin make a commitment to care for your aging parents.

I have learned so much from my father in his old age that it makes his raising of me almost seem beside the point. He has become an unlikely friend to me, and I to him. Your grandfather has a vivid imagination and stories to tell. I just found out that when he was young, he went to Europe, and after visiting France,
Italy, and England, went to Spain, and in Barcelona, he met a young woman and fell in love with her. Her parents refused her hand in marriage (lucky for me, it made way for my beautiful mother!) and my father returned to America brokenhearted. He thought for certain his heart would never heal, and then he met your grandmother—who put him back together again.

I hope you will travel, and not just see the world, but participate in it. I hope that when your heart breaks, you will think of your grandfather and remember that coping with loss and moving forward to love again is the cornerstone of wisdom.

You are surrounded by wisdom. My five brothers and sister have so much to share with you. Cassandra is a different sort of spinster from me, as she still hopes and longs for true love, and is certain it will find her, even at her age. I hope her dream comes true! But I am too practical for that dream any longer, and am happy that she is the guardian of it.

Your father James, and you must never tell anyone this, was my favorite brother! He and I were always simpatico from the start. We loved to go to the library and explore the fields around our home. To this day, if I have a problem, he is the first person I go to, and throughout my life, he has given me clarity. An understanding brother is a gift, and it's a relationship you can count on your whole life long.

I hope you will keep your family of origin in your life through your long and happy marriage.

And now, about writing. I know you share my fondness for reading, and my love of books. I believe that passionate readers can become good writers. If you spend every moment you possibly can, outside of duty, chores, work, and play, with your nose in a book, you will have a respite of glorious solitude that is yours and yours alone. In the noise of this world (and it gets louder every day!) a good woman needs a quiet respite for her thoughts and dreams.

Make books the furniture of your home—pile them high, wide, and deep, next to your sofa, your chairs, your bed—and when you're feeling sad, lonely or in need of inspiration, take one, open it, and let the journey begin. Just the sight of a book—its colorful binding, gold letters, and smooth leather cover—makes me happy.

I hope you will read for
pleasure
your whole life long. And I hope that your reading habit will beget writing, and that you will share your thoughts and feelings on the page. I wish every person would take the time to write down his or her life story, and whatever small gems, conversations, and memories they might have of their grandparents and parents. Can you imagine the gift of ongoing biography with chapters written by each generation? I mourn the fact that I have none to read in the Austen family.

You know your old auntie (I'm forty-one) has written a few novels. I enjoyed the process so much that when I finished one, I could not wait to start another. Writing has sustained my spirit.

Yes, your father has read my novels, and beyond that, I've sent them around. I am a
mid-list
author (so they say), but I find the term vague; it sounds a lot like
middle age
(which I am living in!). The middle is the least exciting place to be, it is safe and just enough. I want more for you. I had high hopes for my creative life. But I found I am not so much a promoter of my books as I am a writer of them. I have made peace with the fact that my novels may never reach a wide audience, and have come to realize that the only audience worth having is the audience of one.

One solitary reader can be moved by words you have written, and if a million more also get the chance, that's lovely. But the truth is, writing gives you more than it can ever give your reader. The persistence that is required to finish any project, including a novel, is a life lesson that one learns over and over again—but the end result, whether it is close to perfect or not, is always satisfying.
A task completed is reward enough. I have embraced the fact that I no longer need accolades, and the attendant recognition that comes with a public career, because I have the satisfaction of leaving a complete manuscript (in my case, six of them) behind, to be stumbled upon in the years to come. The satisfaction that comes from that potential future happy accident completes me.

I hope you will take your dreams seriously, and your writing even more seriously, as you go through life.

I lament the loss of letter writing in our time. I cannot imagine that a tweet or a post, an email or a text, will provide the great thrill of receiving a letter, written by hand. There is so much to learn about a person from their handwriting, and even more in the depths of the words one chooses to express himself. I will miss the ancient way of doing things until I, too, pass away.

You know, dear Anna, I've not been well. I don't like to write the words or acknowledge the truth, because I feel they have some magical power over my diagnosis. But I feel, within me, a winding down, and therefore have settled my affairs. I don't want this to cause you concern; in fact, I only tell you this because it is my wish that you celebrate the wonderful years we have known together, and remember the great laughs and parties, gatherings and walks, trips and celebrations, that belong to us, and to us alone. I could not have asked for a better niece, and I hope that I have been a good aunt to you. You have been a great consolation to me, in the absence of my own children, and in fact, I could not have wished for a better daughter, had I been blessed with one.

Whether it is your good luck (and it will be!) to have children of your own with Declan, know that there are many in the world for you to love, who look to you for encouragement and to lead by example. Children need to see delight in the eyes of adults, if only to give them a sense that happiness is within reach, even when it
isn't. Adults should be full of possibility, so that children might develop a sense of adventure.

Children should live with the confidence that they are loved. Love frees them to embrace adventure, to seek truth, and to take care of one another. I know, when I remember the days of my own childhood, what it meant to me to be welcomed, named, and remembered. It's important.

I hope I have been that star point for you. And no matter what happens in the months to come, I hope to be at your wedding, and I hope to be the aunt that weaves a tiara of fresh white roses for your hair (our family tradition!). If I am not able to do so, know that not one tear should be shed, because I am with you always.

I will be with you as you sing by the piano with your children, I will be with you in summer when you picnic by the lake, and I will be with you as you open a new novel, hopeful and full of anticipation at a good and satisfying read! Take all of this with you as you go through your married life, my dear niece. You are loved in a thousand ways by your dear old aunt, and I will never forget you.

Love and all best wishes for your marriage,
Aunt Jane

E
linor Carsholt was setting the final stitches in a pink linen reticule when someone knocked on the cottage door. Who could that be? In the six months they'd lived in Chawton, there'd been few visitors. She'd not tried to get to know the lower-class people of the village, and not felt comfortable about mingling with the better sort on her very low income.

She wanted to ignore the second knock, but it was Christmas Eve. Perhaps the vicar's sister felt obliged to visit.

She rose, tucking the little bag at the bottom of the mending basket. The reticule was her Christmas present to her sixteen-year-old daughter and she didn't want the surprise spoiled. Amy was upstairs helping her younger sisters with their lessons, but if she heard a visitor she might run down in hope of something to enliven her life.

Elinor smoothed her apron, tucked a stray hair back beneath her cap, and then opened the door.

“Oh! Sir Nicholas.”

The handsome young baronet always described himself as their neighbor, but all that meant was that Ivy Cottage was tucked
into a corner of his estate. He wasn't even their landlord, for the cottage belonged to a cousin of her dead husband's, and he lived twenty miles away. Perhaps Cousin Edwin had asked Sir Nicholas to keep an eye on them, for he was kindly attentive.

When he was at Danvers Hall he usually escorted them home from church, as their ways went together, and he sometimes stepped inside for a cup of tea. He'd generously invited them to make free of his orchards, which had been a great benefit; they were still enjoying the carefully stored apples and pears.

He smiled, bowed, and raised his beaver hat. “Mrs. Carsholt. I hope I find you and your daughters well?”

She dipped a curtsy. “Very well, Sir Nicholas. And you?”

She was always cheered by his visits, but his left arm cradled a cloth-covered basket. She deeply resented being a charity case when so recently she had been the one to dispense largesse to needy villagers.

“In excellent health,” he said, “as are all my family. I think you'll have heard that my brother, Captain Danvers, is recovered from his wounds.”

“Yes, it was mentioned in church, where we'd often prayed for him. I gather he's at the Hall for Christmas.”

“To our great pleasure.”

He wasn't passing over the basket, so she had to say, “Please come in, Sir Nicholas.”

Alas, the door opened directly into the kitchen, which was disordered by Christmas preparations. On Sundays she always left it tidy.

He put the basket on the table. “A few seasonal delicacies I thought might please your daughters, Mrs. Carsholt.”

“It's too kind of you, Sir Nicholas. There really is no need.”

She was being ungracious, but she could smell oranges, and they made her want to weep. In happier days she'd not have
thought oranges to have such an aroma, but after a year without them, it seemed pungent as a bouquet of roses.

If only she had something to offer in return, even a jar of jam, but she was not so provident. An almost-finished pink reticule would hardly serve.

She was struggling for the appropriate way to conclude the conversation when Amy ran down the stairs, all bright eyes and bouncing curls. “Oh, Sir Nicholas! How lovely to see you, sir.”

He bowed again. “And you, Miss Carsholt, in such fine spirits. Are you ready for the morrow?”

“Almost, sir. My sisters and I are finishing our gifts for Mama, and later we'll be going out to gather holly and ivy for the house.”

“And mistletoe?” he asked, with a mischievous smile.