This is the image of Bucky I like best, because it represents, for me, the work of art she created which became her own life - an unfinished portrait, but one which exhibited increasingly the gentle sweetness and tolerance for which she constantly strove. I have used the color combination she loved best, turquoise and purple, for this page.

For me, that life was fraught with both advantages and pitfalls from early days on - manifesting equally her good fortune and her damaging drawbacks! The first of the latter seems to have occurred with the sudden death of her father at a relatively young age! I don't think his adoring daughter Ethel ever really quite got over that tragedy! And at the end of her life especially, what sustained her was her confidence in the love of God and of her father - and my impression is that the sense she had of the one blended inextricably with her sense of the other. She wrote of her father on the hundredth anniversary of his birth:

TO

 

FREDERIC .WILLIAM .FREEMAN

FEBRUARY 14,1854 - JULY 10, 1887

 

................A hundred years ago! But what is time?

................A fresh-cut wound, or dial of the best,

... ............ Unrolling proof on proof that man is blest?

... ............ Some lives there are that glow with the sublime.

... ............ Such was a Boston boy's of years ago

... ............ In Union Park, who played and shoveled snow

... ............ With young Elisha Flagg, his valiant friend,

... ............ Two happy school-boys of the old South End.

 

... ............ Then, poet and athlete, medals from Chauncey Hall.

... ............ Young manhood, filled with rich and happy cares;

... ............ A beautiful wife and home; leaping the stairs

... ............ To romp in the nursery and the upper hall

... ............ Before bed-time; work, song, acting and baseball,

... ............ Children and home, he loved life, loved it all.

 

................Then suddenly, cut off ... the Light went out.

... ............ But he could not die: a shining star he left

... ............ Among his poems: "Life is not here, nor there,

... ............ ........ But with the Lord, and He is everywhere."

 

FEBRUARY 14,1954..

I'm quite sure that the theme - friendship - of her Christmas message for that year had something to do with her need for the "solace" in her loneliness of which she speaks, and that that loneliness became increasingly centered for her on her loss of personal family closeness. We became her adoptive family, and she was clearly grateful for that - but nothing for her could have taken the place of her own family of origin, I believe, except her own inner faith in "Infinity" - which for her was clearly the location of the "family" she loved best. She always loved children best, both my own siblings, my offspring and the children of her older brother and her younger sister Helen. The little boy who gazes meditatively into the fire in the great kitchen fireplace at Journey's End on her card is my youngest brother Peter, but he stands for all the children she loved and spent time with throughout her life!

... ... ... ... Our friends are stars that light the rugged way

... ... ... ... In day-time, as in night, across the moor.

... ... ... ... He who learns friendship never lives apart,

... ... ... ... For it is born from sympathy of heart.

... ... ... ... Softly it comes, like violets of May.

... ... ... ... Slowly it builds, with power to endure.

... ... ... ... Like all things fair, joyous it is, and free,

... ... ... ... Having no boundary but Infinity.

... ... ... ... And as in small the great things we rehearse,

... ... ... ... So the child's candle or the hearth-fire's glow

... ... ... ... May bring a solace deeper than we know.

... ... ... ... Even as the Star of Bethlehem doth bless

... ... ... ... The boundless gift of simple friendliness.

 

..........................

 

 

CHRISTMAS, 1956

 

 

... ... ... ... ... .. WHETHER we know or only guess,

... ... ... ... ... ...God is our constant Friend.

... ... ... ... ... ...A Light more sure than we possess,

... ... ... ... ... ...Shedding its balm on loneliness

... ... ... ... ... ...From towering dome to wilderness,

... ... ... ... ... ...With a rainbow at the end.

 

... ... ... ... ... ...Whether we see its guiding ray,

... ... ... ... ... ...Our humble toil to bless,

... ... ... ... ... ...Or blindly stumble through the night;

... ... ... ... ... ...Yet is it with us all the way.

... ... ... ... ... ...No human power can take Thy Light

... ... ... ... ... ...From man's true consciousness.

 

... ... ... ... ... ...Thus day on day, and year on year

... ... ... ... ... ...Flow through this life we live;

... ... ... ... ... ...Thy children learning, near and far,

... ... ... ... ... ...The message of the Christmas Star,

... ... ... ... ... ...That Thine alone we really are,

... ... ... ... ... ...Thine whom Thou lovingly dost forgive,

... ... ... ... ... ...Oh Father dear!

 

…………………………

 

.........Bucky, Billy and Bill ....Bucky and old Bimbo with Tommy.........Bucky and Ellen....

 

I am reproducing one of her paintings here, which were the true center (for her) of her life's meaning. She had many enthusiasms and talents, but painting was the core for her.

 

......

Her little grey home in the west, in sun and in gloom

 

 

 

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