Fourteenth installment from the diary of my great-grandfather’s sister Alise, written during the First World War. When the diary starts, she is living just a few miles from the front lines of the Eastern Front, and is then forced to flee with her husband and two young daughters to her family’s house near Limbaži as the war moves even closer. For the background, see here, and clicking the tag “diary entries” will bring up all of the entries that I have posted.

January 17, 1916

It is Sunday. Mother and Father went to church. Papa and ArvÄ«ds are at the commission in Valmiera. Life is so somber at home – to the point of boredom. I wish we could get somewhere alone – even if just in the sauna. If we didn’t have to worry about the little ones – then we could bring it all to an end soon. Such is life now??