Tender Spaces

Oct 26th ‘71

Dear Mrs Millar,

I am so stupid I should have written to you ages ago, I don’t think you really understand, what goes on with Gaëtane. She will never be able to work at any job, as she is not normal, you must know that she is absolutely unemployable that is why we wanted you to get her a place of her own.

After your letter, with the clippings (all of which were irrelevant) she put on a dress of Mary’s & my shoes & she tried to get a job at Woodward’s as a girl, no go, so she tried as a boy - jeans from a rummage sale, old runners of Michael’s etc., but no luck as a boy either, and if you don’t think this is terribly sad I do, in fact I’m almost in tears now, to think of her valiant efforts to cope with a world she will never be able to cope with. She is not either a boy or a girl, no amount of psychiatry will ever be able to alter this, she is desperately in love with Rosamund, who is an absolutely beautiful person, loving, & gentle but unable herself to cope with her own life.

Now as I see it you can either lock Bambi up for life or you can help her now. At the moment she has gone off to Saturna Island & is living in the bush in a stick house & it is getting colder & wetter, she went because she feels she is not contributing here towards her keep etc. & I’m sorry if we made her feel that way, at any rate we often have 8-10 young people staying here, so what’s one more!

Now just a word about something we did in my family, 15 years or so ago, for my brother who is schizoid we had a choice, (our parents being dead) to incarcerate him in a mental home, or get him a house of his own. This is what we did, my 3 sisters & my older brother & myself all contributed & bought him a huge ramshackle old manor house in the UK & he has lived there happily in an awful muddle & is now 60 years old & will live there until he dies, we send him a little money & old clothes & the villagers understand about him & are kind, a sort of glorified village idiot situation.

Please help Bambi now. Get her that place, it is beautiful. Offer them $14,000 cash, my sensible children (Mary & her husband & Caroline) will help her set it up, I’m sure dear Peter will help too, ie roof the log house etc. & then she can keep a goat, some chicken & rabbits for food, grow a bit of corn & keep a house & live happily. At any rate give it a try, it might work out, a lot of young people will help Gaëtane I am sure.

Any rate you must not just leave her alone now on Crown Zellerbach, with winter coming & I cannot think you really want her locked up like her mother suggested in an asylum near her in France.

With kindest regards,

Isabel Hunt (Mrs. I. H. Vane Hunt)

P.s. I am sending Gaëtane’s BC medical insurance bill to Mr. Poul(?), she hs needed a few things already, & it will be better to carry insurance, it’s $60 a year this year, but only $6 next year as she will be a BC resident. I see this does not cover hospital benefits & I think I’ll look & find out about that as I feel she should be covered. I.M.H.

P.p.s. I feel rereading this that I am interfering in your family, if you feel the same please try to forgive me, it’s only because I’m gravely concerned about your granddaughter.

I.M.H.