Ghosts in the Nursery

“In search of intimacy, this work moves through the psyche of relation. As a daughter, granddaughter, and great-granddaughter, I wonder what has been received; and as a mother and grandmother, what relational reflexes, family atmospheres and rhythms of attention continue on. War, societal pressures, and organised religion leave their impressions in our family nursery. Habits of love, patterns of silence, strategies of intimacy; rarely taught, rarely named. They are taken in without intention, without language, arriving as atmosphere. The nursery becomes a deepening site of first encounter, where the world is felt through mood, touch, absence, and rule. In this quiet place, larger histories find their way into intimate life. They do not remain outside; they are rocked, fed, disciplined, and prayed over.”