1847 Grand Avenue South, Apartment 2B
Minneapolis, Minnesota
15th November, 1946
My Dearest Clara,
I have started this letter a dozen times, each attempt finding its way into the small fire that burns in my flat’s grate these cold November evenings. The words scatter like ash, but the feelings – those remain, stubborn as Minnesota winter, demanding to be spoken. Perhaps it is fitting that I write to you now as snow begins to dust the windows of Dayton’s, each flake as delicate and individual as the moments that have shaped what lies between us.
You asked in your last letter why I have grown distant, why my responses have become mere echoes of politeness rather than the passionate outpourings you once treasured. The answer sits heavy in my chest, a weight I have carried since your last visit, when you spoke so casually of “taking greater risks,” of “living more boldly.” Do you not understand, my darling Clara, that loving you is already the boldest thing I have ever done?
I confess, I harbour resentment – not towards you, precisely, but towards the ease with which adventure calls to you. How simple it must be to stride through the world with your confidence, to laugh in jazz clubs and charm strangers and speak of travelling to New York as though the very idea doesn’t terrify those of us who have learned that safety lies in stillness. You write of feeling caged by Portland’s familiarity, but you fail to see that some of us have built our cages carefully, brick by brick, because the world outside can be unforgiving to women like us.
When you suggested that I might leave Minneapolis, might “start fresh somewhere new,” I heard beneath your words an impatience with my cautiousness, a judgment of the life I have built with such deliberate care. You see my gentle nature as limitation rather than strength, my preference for quiet evenings as fear rather than wisdom. But Clara, my love, do you not understand that it is precisely my stillness that allows me to hear the nuances in your voice during our precious telephone calls? It is my careful observation that notices when you are troubled, even when your words remain bright?
Yet even as I write these words of reproach, my heart softens with the memory of your laughter echoing through the telephone exchange, that day when our lines first crossed by providence or accident. You asked me then about the weather in Minneapolis, such an ordinary question, but your voice held such warmth that I found myself describing not merely temperature but the way light catches on fresh snow, how silence in winter carries differently than summer’s quiet. You listened – truly listened – in a way that made me feel seen for the first time in years.
This is what I am trying to say, dearest: I am both grateful for your bold spirit and wounded by it. You opened doors in my heart I had sealed shut, convinced me that love between women like us could exist not merely in shadowed corners but in the full light of day, at least between us. Your intellectual curiosity matches my own; our conversations traverse continents of thought, exploring ideas I had only dared examine in solitude. When you speak of Simone de Beauvoir’s writings or debate the future of women’s roles in post-war society, you challenge me to articulate thoughts I had barely admitted to myself.
But Clara, your adventurous nature sometimes feels like a tide threatening to sweep away the careful foundation we have built together. When you speak of risks and bold moves, I fear you grow restless with the measured pace of our love, the necessity of our discretion. I worry that my gentle responses to your passionate declarations seem inadequate, that my romantic gestures – pressed flowers, carefully crafted letters, small tokens that speak of constancy rather than excitement – pale beside the grand adventures you crave.
Perhaps what I am trying to say is this: I love you not despite our differences but because of them. Your boldness gives me courage; my steadiness offers you anchor. Yet I need you to understand that my caution is not cowardice but self-preservation born of hard experience. The miners’ daughters of northern Minnesota learn early that survival requires different skills than those taught to Oregon apple farmers’ daughters.
Can we not find a way forward that honours both your need for adventure and my need for security? Your outgoing spirit and my quiet observation, your intellectual boldness and my emotional depth? I believe we can, if you will meet me halfway – not geographically this time, but in understanding.
I remain, as always, yours in steady devotion and passionate love, waiting for your voice to bridge the miles between us once more.
With all my conflicted heart,
Bertha
P.S. I have enclosed a small photograph from the store’s Christmas display—we are already preparing for the holidays, and I thought you might enjoy seeing how the winter light falls across the mannequins in their festive gowns. Somehow it reminds me of the way conversations with you illuminate even the most ordinary moments, transforming them into something worth remembering.
Bob Lynn | © 2025 Vox Meditantis. All rights reserved. | 🌐 Translate
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