Orla Merrin’s Wishing Line Log -- Entry #224
Date: August (sunny but windy)
Location of Find: Bench outside the Weaver’s Cottage
Ribbon: None -- folded inside a square of red upholstery fabric
Note: “May the weight of what I carried rest in the wood not in me."
Houtman's story captures the raw solitude of grief where silence fills the house and memory becomes both comfort and burden. A widower navigates casseroles paperwork and well meaning strangers while clinging to photo albums whiskey and the echo of love now gone. The writing is spare but deeply evocative each detail an old wristwatch a worn floorboard a muted TV carrying the ache of absence. Poised between despair and fragile belief An Empty Chair reflects on time loss and the stubborn endurance of memory.