Cabot Head Lighthouse c. 1898

This late 19th century photograph of the Cabot Head Lighthouse on Georgian Bay captivated me.

Who is the woman standing in the doorway, at the entrance to what was once the kitchen?

She seems to be pausing for a moment at the door’s threshold—that is, in a space that is betwixt and between the inside of the lighthouse and a wild outside.

Inside are all her endless domestic chores: washing, cooking, laundry, tending to children…and yet it looks as if the wind has taken up the edge of her apron and is mischievously beckoning her to come outside into a wind-swept day and all that it might hold.

As a 21st century woman, I was strangely drawn to this figure. I so often feel the pull of the “inside”—all its chores, duties and responsibilities—and yet I find myself sometimes wishing that I could step out into a “wild” and see what it holds for me. I often feel like a person caught on a threshold—betwixt and between. I suspect that this has much to do with the swirl of contradictory social expectations that still exist for many women.

Then I wondered: did the woman turn around and go back inside? Or did she step out into the wind and sunshine?

Would I write a conventional book about Cabot Head or would I try something more adventurous…say an Eco-Gothic novel?

Then it struck me. If she were alive today to tell me about her choice, the woman would be around 134 years old.

That was the moment when I decided to step across my own “threshold” and go out into a “wild” by  writing Perdita….

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