On Friday evenings Helen and I enjoy a couple of relaxing hours watching a television movie.
Two days ago we chose ANNE OF GREEN GABLES on ABC iview. It has recently been released by Canada Television.
Our choice was made as the book played a significant role in the life of Vivienne, my elder and only sister, who passed away just a few years ago.
Viv and I grew up in the years of the Great Depression of the 1930’s when our dad Herb was a labourer earning the minimum wage and we struggled to survive. One Christmas our mother Thelma gave each of us a book. It was precious as it was the very first and only book that was ours.
I got Robert Louis Stevenson’s great boys book KIDNAPPED. Viv received L N Montgomery’s legendary best seller ANNE OF GREEN GABLES and she loved it. I watched on as she read it over and over again countless times, often telling me that one day she would visit Avonlea on Prince Edward Island in Canada ‘to meet Anne’.
Viv lived to be 93 but finally made her pilgrimage to Anne about a decade before her passing. I phoned her when she reached Green Gables and I listened with happiness for her as she quietly wept joyful tears.
She often told me down the years that the wonderful message of Anne was that you always must be sensible. Viv was. I missed out.
I salute the millions of young women world wide who went on to lead sensible and happy lives because of Anne.
Thank you Viv for being my sensible sister.
Everald
