A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman
Her great-grandparents lived in a cottage, in the north, but not terribly far north - a small, plain abode nestled between the dense forest, a quaint garden of lilies, tulips, and hydrangeas, and the lake. Often they drove out, in late summer, and when they arrived the girl would head immediately for the lake, nearly flinging her shoes off and tiptoeing into the dark, tepid water, careful not to disturb any minnows. It was the minnows that she especially liked and which she would catch and and pour into a bucket only to later dump them clumsily into the lake. When the minnows were in hiding and the bumblebees cared not to hover lackadaisically about the tulips, she would be listlessly wandering inside the cottage. Sometimes, the girl would sit cross-legged on the navy blue armchair, her feet still rough and cold from the lake water, and watch her great grandmother solve a crossword puzzle. Perhaps it was the boredom, or perhaps it was the slow, elegant way with which her grandmoth