A woman I wish I had known

Of course I knew my mother, but equally obviously, I didn't know her as a young woman. In this photo she is in her late teens or early twenties, with her fiancee Claude Louis, who died of tuberculosis before the wedding. At least that's the story as I remember it, and now I have no idea who I could ask to check on whether or not I have the story straight. As a child I was fascinated by the idea that my mother might have married someone else. At the time I thought that meant that if she had, I would still be in the world, still myself, but with a different father and different family. And how poignant to see this image of Claude's shadowed face, a young man who would soon be gone and is now forgotten by almost everyone - if that is Claude, and if I have the facts right!

I love her expression and pose, I love the hat, and I love the reflection of the water on the sides of the boat.