stefansson-wrangel-09-34-020

16

month until she got with child, then it stopped and did not
happen again until she gave up suckling the child. It was
that natural and uncomplicated, no more worthy of comment than
the coming up of the moon, or the changing of seasons from
autumn to winter to spring, or the taking of a woman by a man
who wanted her.

But for her it was never that simple. For her
it was always a time of agony which began with a brooding sense
of foreboding, grinding down cheerfulness and bringing such a
heaviness upon her that she was of no use to herself or anyone
else for days on end. It was not pain so much as an intolerable
pressure plunging her into an abyss of black despair. A single
word from anyone was enough, then, to send her into a paroxysm
of weeping. She tried not to believe in evil spirits, yet
surely at the moon cycle one did take possession of her body,
jabbing and twisting and tightening until, finally, her whole
being became one silent scream.

And how explain any of this to boys who could
not possibly understand? Even Crawford would not understand.
So she had said nothing, and felt their disapproval, and had
known suddenly that they hated her and wished her dead. She
did not remember clearly what happened after she had decided
that, but she had become hysterical, begging them not to use
their knives, to shoot her instead, which they would not do.
They simply believed she had gone mad overnight. And at that
point she had tried to kill herself.

"April 16th.
I was out to the traps but see nothing and when
I come home I starded chew my boot soles and
then sew them on and I finish them by evening.
Wind from east."