Istanbul

Istanbul, Turkey, is a place where I almost died. Just as I turned 3 years old, my family moved from the US to Isanbul. We had a house that was right on the Bosporus, a body of water that connects the Black Sea with the Sea of Marmara. One day I tumbled into the Bosporus, and would have drowned if not for my older sister, Paige, who was around 14 at the time. She heard the yells of our servant, who could not swim, and rushed out to dive in and save me. (Thanks, Paige!) The image above is the Bosporus, as seen from Satellite, and below is one of me at three, on the very edge of the Bosporus, tempting fate.

Last night I found a family Christmas card handwritten by my mother while we were living in Turkey. Mom has been dead for 40 years now, so it is rare for me to come across her handwriting. Her note is below. I have no idea who Aunt Jane was, but I was the baby she refers to. (My younger sister Temple was born just over a year later, after we returned to the US.)

And here is the front side of the card:

Here is a photo of me with both my parents while we were living abroad, taken in 1958 or '59. It looks as if whatever I was saying to them was amusing. I'm guessing now that I was having a vision of the future, and telling them all about the internet, and how someday I would put photos of them on my blog.



UPDATE: Aha! The mysterious Aunt Jane my mother was writing that Christmas note to has now been identified, thanks to my helpful brother Richard. She was Jane Erin Emmet de Glehn (1873-1961). She was the youngest sister of my great grandfather, Robert Temple Emmet. She was married to the artist Wilfred Gabriel de Glehn (1870-1951) and was also an artist herself, one of several women artists in the Emmet family, including Jane's sister Lydia Field Emmet. Below is a painting by John Singer Sargent, from 1907, showing Jane painting, with her husband nearby:

'The Fountain, Villa Torlonia, Frascati, Italy'

And below is an older Jane, painted by her husband:

And finally, here is one of Jane's own paintings: