The Lady Hermes

I hope my friend and fellow illustrator Carolyn Croll (illustrator of SWEET POTATO PIE, which I wrote,) will read this.  She’ll understand why it makes me think of her and send her good wishes.

A few nights ago I went to an art opening at our newly renovated Byram Schubert Library, which has a spacious and beautiful gallery.  The show was huge, and the artist being honored was my middle child, Lizzy Rockwell, who is an illustrator.  There were plenty of visitors, framed pictures everywhere, good nibbles, old friends, and it was a festive evening.  So if you happen to be in the neighborhood of Greenwich, Connecticut, head for this wonderful branch library and check the show out.

Lizzy, as her father was, is a wonderful naturalist-artist.  When I saw the images I’ve posted here, I was taken back many years into her childhood.

She was not quite three years old, and her sister, Hannah, was almost six.  We were spending the month of August on Block Island to escape the heat and smog of New York City.  At that time, Block Island wasn’t the trendy neo-Hamptons place it has become.  But it was on the main flyway for migrating birds, and apparently Monarch butterflies too.

The cottage we rented was surrounded by milkweed, the only plant Monarchs eat.  I had written and illustrated two children’s’ books, was working on my third, and on the island I got an idea for another book--one I would write and my husband would illustrate instead of me.  I thought his work would be perfect for the book I had in mind.  Our book SALLY’S CATERPILLAR would tell the story of the metamorphosis of the magnificently striped caterpillar into the regal Monarch.   

Unlike some illustrators, my husband was a thorough researcher.  From the moment we discussed the idea we captured caterpillars, filled empty peanut butter jars with milkweed leaves, punched breathing holes in the lids of the jars, and put a caterpillar in each one and watched them eat and eat and grow and grow and finally climb to the lid of the jar, spin a string of black silk and transform itself into a jade green chrysalis wearing a necklace of tiny gold beads.  Rocky drew the inhabitants of each jar in every stage of its journey.  I wish I had those sketches, which were usually on any piece of paper he found lying around.  He was an inveterate thrower-awayer and they’ve vanished, although I think I may have salvaged them and donated them to the deGrummond Collection at University of Southern Mississippi. I hope so, for they were beautiful.

Those were the days before FedEx, and since he earned his living as a commercial artist for advertising he had to leave the island one day to pick up and deliver in two days a job that paid too well for him to turn down, even though he was on vacation.  So off he went on the ferry to New London, then the train to New York, to return two days later.  We didn’t have a car on the island, but the girls loved to walk into the village for ice-cream cones each afternoon.  It had become a not-to-be-missed ritual.

Unfortunately, one chrysalis had turned dark and transparent that morning, and I could see the shadowy form of a butterfly inside.  I knew what that meant.  The chrysalis was ready to burst at any moment!  But at the same time, so many flavors of ice cream were beckoning.  

 

Suddenly I was inspired.  I took off the jar lid the silk thread holding the chrysalis was attached to, and poised it carefully between the slats of a pair of kitchen chairs Hannah and I put in the backyard.  We chose a spot sheltered from the hot sun and constant winds of the island.  That way, should the butterfly emerge, it would be free to fly away.  

Hannah, being older, could understand what we were up to. So when our work was done, she trotted along ahead on the road with her neighbor friends.  But Lizzy had to hold my hand, being too slow and too little to keep up with the big girls

She seemed worried.  She kept asking me about the chrysalis, wanting to know why I had opened the jar and suspended the precious chrysalis between the chairs.  She frowned as she asked her questions.  I found myself figuring out how to come up with an intelligent three-year old’s understanding of this complex yet miraculous natural process.  (I believe that’s the moment when I learned to write, and love writing, non-fiction books for the very youngest).  

Suddenly Lizzy, who, then as now, gestured with her arms and hands when speaking (as I do), opened her arms wide and cried joyously, “And then he will be a worm angel!”

I have never forgotten that beautiful day.  I don’t think Lizzy has either.