World War II, Carnival Life, and Family Relationships in Carnival Girl

Here is an Article about Carnival Girl, published in Meridian Magazine. The writer, Jennie Hansen, does a wonderful job explaining the complexities of the book. Enjoy this really great review!

Meridian Magazine: World War II, Carnival Life, and Family Relationships in Carnival Girl

Meeting Verna Towne

Cortez was supposed to be a larger city, but to me it looked like the stage-setting of a Spaghetti Western. Again, the buildings and stores were flat and low, spread out with so much unused space around them that I was glad to be surrounded by the comforting metal of the car.

The hospital wasn’t any different. Low and spread out, we had to walk for what seemed like hours, instead of coming in and taking an elevator to the right section.

We entered a room with white walls. A single bed stood in a corner, and the winter sunlight streamed through a window onto the foot end of the bed. An older woman with fashionably slanted glasses, rhinestones on each side, lay propped up in the bed, watching a TV hanging on the wall. 

She looked up and smiled.

“Mom,” Gary said and rushed into her embrace.

Mrs. Towne smiled at me then turned to Gary. “Is this your new bride?”

Gary introduced us and I held out my hand for the customary German handshake.

“Come closer,” she said, and when I did, she reached out with both arms and hugged me.

I was taken aback by the too sudden familiarity of my new mother-in-law, but at the same time, the instant friendliness of my new American relatives pleased and disarmed me. Verna’s warm smile and soft touch made me like her immediately.

 In Germany, her actions would have been too forward, but I kept telling myself I was in Colorado now, and Americans were supposed to be much friendlier.

“It’s good to meet you, Sonja,” Mrs. Towne said while holding my hand. “Welcome to my family. And thanks for giving me a grandchild.” 

She patted my six-month pregnant belly. In Germany I would have been inspected and talked about for a few days, and maybe eventually gotten close to my new mother-in-law, but, I reminded myself, I’m not in Germany anymore. 

Gary’s mom was doing well. She told me about her operation. I didn’t understand everything, but I did learn that she would stay in the hospital another week, however, to make sure her ulcers were all gone and she was healthy enough to come home.

Verna Towne

Verna Towne in 2006. We all love and miss her!

Verna Towne passed away last night, at 91 years of age. Even though we should have been prepared, the family is reeling. Grandma was a great and wonderful influence in all our lives, and for me, she had become a true mother. The next few blog posts will be about her and about me getting to know and love her. Here’s the first one. 

Culture Shock

It was dark when we arrived at my husband’s parents home in Colorado. I was jetlagged and my head kept dropping onto my chest on the ride from the airport. I had only one desire, to find a bed and sleep.

Gary opened the car door and helped me out of the car. A large dog came up to me, alternately barking and wagging its tail. I shrank back. That dog was larger than a German shepherd, with thick, dark fur. He took a sniff at my extended belly, and I expected him to take a bite out of me. But before Gary could even say a word, the dog quit barking and licked my hand.

“Triton smells the baby inside you,” Gary said petting the dog who now had lost interest in me and was smiling a doggie smile at my husband. “He is never friendly to strangers, but somehow he knows you’re part of the family.”

A stranger to me, an older version of Gary, came from the house, hugged me and led me into his home.

Gary showed me a bedroom and finally I could sleep.

The next day, I watched Gary make breakfast. He turned on the faucet over the kitchen sink and let it run. Soon the water coming out steamed. I was surprised. This house had running hot water. In my apartment in Germany, I had to heat the water on the stove when I wanted it hot.

Gary said, “If you’re up to it, let’s go visit Mom in the hospital in Cortez.”

I had slept long and well, and was up to it.

I followed my husband out of the house, and that’s when culture shock really set in. 

*****

Tomorrow I'll post more about culture shock and the first time I met Verna Towne .

Elfriede Markus

Elfriede Edel as a Young Widow

 Mutti’s mother was a widow when Mutti was four years old. She was young and pretty, and wanted to have a man in her life. She went out dancing and having fun while leaving the little girl all alone at home. Eventually she married again, and her name changed from Elfriede Edel to Elfriede Markus.

Elfriede was very young when Mutti was born. She was far from her family and didn’t really know how to raise a child. In many ways, Mutti was emotionally and physically abused. She told me a few years ago that parents of that time hit their children and rarely praised them as a matter of course.

 My wedding in 1973. Elfried and Max are in the front, with my baby brother Michael between them. I'm right behind Max, and my father is next to me with my sister Josefa. Mutti is on the right behind Elfriede, with my husband Gary next to her.

And that’s the reason why I never met my grandmother Elfriede until my wedding at 23. When Mutti was still small, she swore she’d never hit her children. When the war was finally over, Mutti was six months pregnant, so she and Vati got married as soon as they could, with no one of Mutti’s family in attendance.

A year or so later, before traveling to Berlin became very difficult, Mutti and Vati visited Max and Elfriede Markus in Berlin. Then they took their circus back to Hessen, the heartland of Germany. Mutti had no contact with her mother. They never wrote each other. Telephoning was out of the question because of our constant travels. My grandmother must have tried to visit when I was small, but I don’t remember that. When we were older, Mutti told us children that she had no wish to have her mother close to her children, because she was afraid Elfriede would hit us. She didn’t want that, and she didn’t want to deal with her mother.

However, by the time I was 23, they had contacted each other again, and my grandmother was invited, and came, to my wedding. I never met her again after that.

But even though I grew up without grandparents, I hope I have become a pretty good grandmother! I enjoy being a grandmother very much!

Fahrtenschwimmer (Swimming, Part Two)

                                              My Fahrtenschwimmer decal looked a lot like this one

When I was a teenager, Mutti left the Carnival with us girls and little Michael. We stayed in the caravan home in Wetzlar for about one year, then moved into an apartment in a tiny town close to Wetzlar. I rode my bicycle to Wetzlar to work every morning.

I was seventeen by that time, but because I had left school at fourteen, and because of our constant traveling I had never made any friends.

A seventeen-year-old without friends is a rare thing! Something had to take the place of friends, and I did find two things that delighted me to no end. I had converted to the LDS church two years earlier, and in our tiny branch in Wetzlar I made a friend, a girl with whom I’m still in contact today. However, she lived in Giessen, about twelve miles from Wetzlar, and even further away from the tiny town I lived in, so we saw each other only occasionally, and when we took the train to visit each other.

The other thing that I delighted in doing might have found me friends, but because of my background, which taught me to be careful and not make friends because I would just lose them again, and because of a natural shyness of strangers, it never did.

But I did have fun! I went to the indoor pool in Wetzlar every week or so, to swim, teach myself to dive, jump off the board, and in general delight in playing in the water. Most of the kids in the pool were younger and I kept to myself for the above mentioned reasons. I learned to swim on my back and under water, but I never could teach myself the crawl, which is so commonly taught here in the States.

One day, I was playing along the rim of the pool when the life saver on duty, and older man, at least twenty-five, bent down and talked to me. “I see you here a lot. Would you be interested in getting your Fahrtenschwimmer?”

I had heard of Fahrtenschwimmer before, but wasn’t sure if I could do it. “What exactly would I have to do to get it?”

“You have to be able to swim for fifteen minutes without touching the bottom or the sides and dive for ten meters and bring up one of these blocks.” He held up a black rubber block with a handle. “They’re only five pounds. Also, you have to dive off the high board and swim on your back without using your arms.”

“I don’t know.” I frowned at the man. “It sounds hard.”

“It isn’t. I’ve seen you do all of that just for fun. If you pass, you’ll get your certification. You could go on from there, take another test, and even become a lifesaver, if you want.”

That sounded great to me. “How much does it cost?”

“It’s only five Marks. I have regular times when I administer the test. You’ll be certified right afterward. So how about it?”

“Yes. I want to do it.”

“Come with me to my office, and we’ll set you up.”

Two weeks later, on a Saturday when I didn’t have to work, I took my Fahrtenschwimmer test and passed it. I received a little decal and a blue booklet certifying that I passed and could go on from there.

At home, I showed it to Mutti, but she was busy with Michael and just glanced at it. I put it away, intending to take the next test, which included forty-five minutes of swimming and some diving. But things got in the way, and I never went back for it.

However, I still delight in swimming and water play.

Swimming, Part One

 I only know how to swim breast stroke, and here is why!

I love going to aqua aerobics in the mornings. I enjoy moving in the water, swimming a lap or two and the companionship of the other gym members. But I only swim in breast stroke. Here’s why.

When I was little, in the winters, we attended the same school for about four to five months One day in late November when I attended fifth grade I came home, looking for Mutti. She was in the living room, reading.

“Do I have a swimsuit, Mutti?”

She looked up from her book. “I think you do. Look in your drawer. Why?”

“The teacher said that we will have swimming lessons every Wednesday afternoon, right before we come home. I need to bring a swimsuit.”

“Okay. See what you can find.”

I dropped my satchel onto the kitchen bench and went into the bedroom, pulled out the drawer and dug through mine and Josefa’s underwear. Yes, there was a suit. It was a bright, cheery blue. I pulled it out, and while I was alone, took off my clothes and tried it on. It was a little tight, but still fit. “I found one, Mutti,” I called through the half open door as I put my clothes on again.

On Wednesday the teacher herded us into a school bus and took us to the local indoor pool. “Here are the dressing rooms,” he announced as we walked through the wet and bleachy smelling hallway. He pointed to one side. “This one is for the girls.” Go change into your suits, girls, and wait in the pool area.”

We dressed in the common area, and in no time were in the pool area. The teacher was already there. After all the children were assembled and the teacher had done a headcount (We were about sixteen children) he asked, “Which of you already knows how to swim?”

Three boys and four girls raised their hands. “Okay. You can go to the deep end and play until I’m done with the beginners. Then I’ll teach you some tricks.” He turned to the rest of us. “Line up in the water, please, hands on the rim.”

I followed the children into the pool, hanging on to the rim. The water was surprisingly warm, not as cold as it usually was in the outdoors pools we sometimes played in, in the summers.

Teacher had us line up on the rim of the pool and showed us how to move our legs in the breast stroke pattern. He left us to practice and went to work with the swimmers.

I enjoyed my swimming classes every week and practiced with enthusiasm. But I was a little too wary of the water to let go and let the water carry me. When classes were over in February, I still hadn’t learned how to swim, but I knew the breast stroke movements very well.

That summer I had the opportunity to visit an outdoor pool in one of the towns we held our carnival in. I played around in the shallow end, enjoying the cold water and the feeling of cleanliness it gave me.

“Let’s play together,” a local girl suggested, and we chased each other around in the water. Eventually she caught me and pushed me under. I was scared, but when I came up again she was laughing. “Your turn,” she said, and I dunked her. I pretended I liked to be dunked too, and by the end of our play my fear had gone.

As we ventured into a little deeper water, I pushed off the ground and actually floated. I remembered my breast stroke movements and before I knew it, I was swimming. I had a wonderful time practicing my swimming for two days and then it got cold and started raining, and I couldn’t go back to the pool.

I forgot that girl’s name, but I still remember how I wished I could have stayed her friend and not leave for the next town and the next carnival.

Tomorrow I’ll talk more about swimming

Bath Time!

 This room in a bathhouse is a little older, but it's very similar to the ones I used to take baths in when I was a girl.

 Vati moved the caravan to the end of the commons, hooked up the stairs, and we children exploded from our tiny home, exploring our new surroundings. Geese waddled on the grassy meadow, and down a small incline we found a pond.

“Children, come eat,” I heard Mutti call from the direction of our caravan.

My stomach was grumbling. I skirted around a goose and followed my sisters home.

We crowded each other at the kitchen table. Mutti ladled out potatoes and peas and carrots for everyone. Finally she sat down with a sigh. She took a few bites.

Franz pokes Josefa, who squealed.

Mutti said, “Quit making all that noise. And look at you! You children aren’t just noisy, you are filthy.” She turned to Vati. “These children need a bath. We’re close to Giessen, why don’t we all go take a bath tomorrow?”

Vati put down his fork. “I do have some time. Okay, we’ll go first thing in the morning.”

Cool! I remembered the last time I took a bath. That must have been at the beginning of the traveling season. I couldn’t wait. It would be fun.

After breakfast the next morning I had forgotten all about bathing. I swallowed my breakfast roll and drank the rest of my milk in the cup, ready to go outside where the sun was shining.

“Just a minute,” Mutti called after me. “Carmen, Sonja, Josefa, stay here. You girls are old enough to get your own stuff for the bath. I don’t have to do everything for you.”

“What do we need to take?” Josefa asked.

Carmen, as the oldest, knew. “New underwear and socks, dummy,” she said.

Josefa and I took off for the bedroom, where our clothes were stashed in shallow drawers under the bed.

“And don’t forget a new dress,” Mutti called after us.

Carmen showed us how to wrap everything into the dress, and we were ready. Mutti had hers, Vati’s, Franz’s and the baby’s stuff in her large shopping bag.

Vati must have been glad to go to the bathhouse, too, since he wasn’t grumbling and had the car already started.

Franz and we three big girls squeezed into the back of the VW. Mutti stashed the clothes under the hood of the car and sat next to Vati, Eva in her lap.

At the bathhouse, Vati paid for all of us. We children cost 25 pfennig each, and Mutti and Vati cost 50 each, which was half a Deutsche Mark, or half of 25 US cents.

The attendant, and rotund woman with gray hair, handed me and my sisters each a bar of soap and a towel and reminded us not to take too long. I balanced the towel and soap on top of my dress, the same way Carmen and Josefa did.

Vati took Franz’s towel, took Franz by the hand, and they left for the men’s section.

Like little ducklings, we trailed after Mutti. She showed us three adjacent cabins, one for each girl, and told us she’d be in the one next to Josefa with Eva.

Mutti told me and Josefa to watch Eva in the hall while she went into Carmen’s cabin with her and started the bathwater. She did the same for me and Josefa, then disappeared into her cabin with the baby.

I found myself in a tiny cabin, just large enough for a bathtub and a wooden seat on the opposite wall. I could lock the door! That was fun. We had no locking door in the caravan. After I locked and unlocked it a few times I deposited my clothes and the towel on the bench and put the soap into the soap holder by the bathtub. By the time I had my clothes off, the tub was more than half full. I turned off the faucets and sank into the wonderful warm water. How nice it would be to have warm or hot water running out of the walls in the caravan. But that wasn’t possible; even I knew that.

In the tub I drew soap letters onto my arms and legs, splashed with my hands and feet and turned over and over like an otter I had seen in a book once. I felt like singing but knew it was verboten, forbidden. Also, Mutti didn’t like it when any one sang, so I didn’t.

Eventually I remembered to wash my always cropped hair. I dove under the water to rinse off the soap. That was so much fun. When I finally got out. I thought that I still had soap in my hair, so I carefully started the water again, the way Mutti had shown me, first the hot and then a little of the cold until it felt right. I held my head under the faucet and let the water run through my hair and down my neck.

Someone knocked on the door. I turned off the water. “Hurry up,” Carmen said, loudly, but not too loud so as not to bother other bathers. “Mutti is already out.”

I held my head against the door and said, “I’m already done. I just have to dress.” Hopefully, I wouldn’t be the last one to be out.

With the towel, I rubbed my hair and my body dry and slipped into my clean clothes. The old ones I rolled into the old dress and unlocked the door. My sisters and Mutti sat in the waiting room at the end of the hallway. My heart sank. Mutti would be mad that I was the last one out. But then I realized Vati and Franz weren’t there yet. Good. She wouldn’t single me out then.

I ran into the waiting room and plopped onto the bench next to a scrubbed and damp Josefa. From the men’s section, Vati came out, skin red and hair wet. Franz trailed after him, also with wet hair.

That night in our caravan, I went to sleep with the sweet smell of soap and lavender in my nose.

Water

 A typical small town well in Germany. I got water from many wells like that.

Oh, how I hated it when Mutti said, “Sonja, take the canister and get some water!”

She might have run out cooking or mopping the kitchen floor (which was almost impossible to keep clean with seven people coming and going all the time.)

I’d grab the hated canister, an old U.S. army metal contraption Vati had exchanged from an American soldier for some free circus tickets. He got it when I was a baby; before he lost the circus. It had a small opening on the top with a chained-on screw-in lid, and it was heavy even without water. But, living in a caravan, it was an important part of our lives. We had no running water, and at that time, we also had no way to store a large amount of water. So, every day or two, one of us children had to get water.

If we were in a small town, I’d go to the town’s well, located near the center of the town. It had a trough connected to the pump, which was always full of water, ready for the cows and other livestock to come home in the evenings and take a drink before going on to their barns. I’d put the canister onto the grate under the pump, grab the long handle and pump it up and down for the water to come up. Until I was about twelve, I could not carry the canister when it was completely full. It held about ten gallons. I filled it as full as I could carry and dragged it back to the caravan home.

In towns where the well wasn’t close, Vati asked a neighboring farmer if we could get water from his outside tap.

To save water, Mutti made us wash only our hands and faces in the evenings. I don’t think I saw a toothbrush until I was ten.

To get us ready for bed, Mutti filled a bowl half-full with water and put it onto the kitchen table. She grabbed the baby, little Eva, or later, baby Michael, and wiped her face with a rag reserved for the children. Then she soaped her hands and rinsed them in the water.

The next-oldest child was next. We used the same water for the three youngest, and the same face rag for all of us. When it came my turn, I swiped the rag over my face. Sometimes Mutti inspected our work. “You missed your mouth,” she might say, or, “wash your ears, too.” But most often she didn’t even look. The last one, Carmen, poured the used water into the slush bucket by the door and put away the bowl.

One after the other, we tromped into the back compartment, the children’s bedroom, took off our clothes and slipped into the cold bed.

Tomorrow I’ll talk more about water in the caravan.

Home Again!

                          Many German police cars looked like this at that time.

            “That’s not ours,” I said. My heart beat faster, and the pastry in my stomach roiled. Maybe Jesus didn’t want me to go home again. Maybe He didn’t love me, after all. I grabbed Josefa’s hand, the only support I had left in this world. Josefa squeezed my hand and started crying again.

“Don’t cry,” the policeman said. He didn’t seem too upset. “I know of another place where your family probably is. Let’s go.”

He started the car and off we went. This time I watched the streets. I didn’t feel like admiring the stars anymore. What would happen to me if the policeman didn’t find our caravan home? Maybe I would die, since I was such a bad girl and couldn’t even take care of my sister. My eyes burned and tears threatened to come again. Then I remembered my prayer, and how peaceful I felt when it was over. Jesus would help. I sighed and closed my eyes. “Please, let us find our home,” I whispered so Josefa couldn’t hear. A sense of safety surrounded me.

The car went around a dark corner onto a dirt road. At the edge of the car’s lights, I made out two people running toward us. I thought they looked like our parents, but for a moment I wasn’t sure. I gripped Josefa’s hand harder. However, when they came into the light, it was our Vati and Mutti.

“There are my parents,” I yelled. Everything was okay now. I hadn’t hurt anyone, and the police had even helped me. Mutti would be mad, but that was okay, as long as I was home again.

The policeman stopped the car and said, “All right! I told you I’d find your family.”

He stepped from the car and talked to Vati. I opened the door and got out. Josefa scrambled after me.

Mutti bent and put her hands on Josefa’s shoulders. “Are you all right? God, I was so worried.”

I stood in front of the car, hands folded over my chest. Mutti let go of Josefa, turned to me and touched my face. “What happened? Where have you been?” she said. “We worried out of our minds. Vati and I were just on our way to the police.”

 “We got lost,” I said.

The policeman said good bye and shook our hands. “It was a pleasure to be able to help you two ladies.”

Josefa giggled.

Mutti gazed at me, frowned and shook her head. “Come on,” she said. She didn’t seem too mad. We scurried after her and Vati, back to our caravan home.

“We already ate,” Mutti said. “It’s late, but I’ve saved you some food. Hurry and eat and go to bed.”

“The nice policemen gave us some pastries,” I said. “I’m not hungry.”

“Me neither,” Josefa said.

Finally back in our warm home, we took off our clothes and washed our faces in the kitchen bowl before we went to bed.

Safely in my bed, I folded my hands and whispered a heartfelt “Thank you,” to Jesus.

Winter Quarters

                                          Our new car looked a lot like this one!

The winter I was nine, we stayed in Wiesbaden for winter quarters, where I would attend third grade more regularly. When we arrived in Wiesbaden, Vati pulled our caravan home through a drizzly, dark afternoon. I sat on the bolted-down bench in front of the kitchen table, hugging the wall and peering out the window in anticipation, wondering what our new winter quarters would look like.

I thought back to my first grade winter in Atzbach, the only town in Germany that had storks at that time. In the summers, they lived in a huge nest on top of the school chimney. I had still been there, attending school, when the storks arrived in the spring. I loved these great, ungainly birds. Too bad we couldn’t go back to Atzbach. It would have been so nice to see the storks again.

But last year hadn’t been bad, either. That was my second grade year, and we spent that winter in Weilmünster. Vati had exchanged his old BMW motorcycle for a black VW bug with two tiny, egg-shaped rear windows, and blinkers that came out on the outside of the car, like little red flags. But the most exciting thing that year was the birth of our youngest sister Eva.

Now, once again on our way to winter quarters, the rubber tires of our home rolled along the ruts of the path, pulled by Vati’s old Deutz tractor. With every jolt, the caravan swayed. A large open field, fenced in on two sides and the back, seemed to be Vati’s goal for our caravan. Weeds grew like a small forest along the sides. Close to the fence on the right snuggled three other caravans, painted a light blue in contrast to our dark brown ones. One of them seemed a home, recognizable by the curtains in the windows. Two unfamiliar pack trailers flanked it, probably holding a carousel and other carnival attractions. I searched the windows of that caravan home. Maybe the family had children, and I’d finally have a friend for more than a week. I couldn’t wait to go outside and see.

Vati maneuvered our home around the other caravan and positioned it next to our pack trailer, which he had towed there the day before.

The Deutz made one more “chug,” and stopped. Mutti unwrapped the radio from its blankets on the sofa and placed it on the shelf over the coffee table. She directed Carmen to unlock the cabinets in the kitchen. Eva, ten months old, sat in her playpen in a corner of the living room, watching the commotion. Josefa and I stood by the sliding door that divided the kitchen from the living room, craning our necks to see what Mutti was doing.

“Get out of my way,” Carmen said as she rushed by me and Josefa. Little Franz, bundled in his jacket, pushed through and went outside, trailing after Vati, who connected our caravan home to the electricity and made sure everything was settled.

Mutti squeezed around Josefa to get into the kitchen. “You’re in my way. Why don’t you two go outside for a while,” she suggested.

I looked at Josefa, who must have felt as out of place as I did in our cramped home. I had an idea. “Let’s explore the new place.”

Josefa’s eyes lit up. We went to the hook by the door, grabbed our coats and struggled into them while we barreled down the steps which Vati had already connected to the outside of the front door.

Oma

 

Mutti's mother (my grandmother), in the photo Mutti showed me.

The last time Mutti visited me from Germany I made it my goal to talk to her about her childhood and about mine. Even now, after all these years, there are some things we cannot talk about. However, Mutti loves to talk about her childhood and youth.

This is a recreation of one of our conversations.

Mutti has been with us for a week now. We still have two more weeks before she has to fly back to Germany again.

One morning Mutti comes downstairs, an unfamiliar photo album under her arm. She smiles at me. “I brought some pictures.”

We sit on the sofa, and Mutti opens the album. She points to a yellowed black and white photo of a young woman walking down the street, wrapped in a fur coat. A large hat shadows her face, and her expression tells of self-confidence and an awareness of her own beauty.

“That’s my mother,” Mutti says. “She was still young, and she wanted to have some fun and be married again after my father’s death.”

“How old were you when your father died?”

“About five. After my Vati died, Mother used to go out a lot. Sometimes she’d come home with a new boyfriend, and then she told me to go out and play.”

Mutti smiles. “That was before Hitler rose to power. After Vati passed away, I became a real street urchin. My friend’s mother was a widow too and worked all day. So Mädi and I used to play in the streets after school. We knew that whole area of Berlin like our backyards. We never got lost or in trouble.”

I think of my own childhood, where I was in a different town every week or so. “It must have been nice to grow up in one place.”

“It was. I never grew tired of being outside. After my mother remarried, I still spent a lot of time outside, just to be out of her hair, especially when Max was home.”

Mutti flicks through the pictures. I had never met her mother, which is my grandmother, until I got married at 23, right before I left for the United States. I realize Mutti's childhood probably wasn’t what she remembers now. It must have been hard for her to have been on her own all the time. Even now, Mutti doesn’t realize how unloving her own mother had been.

Uncle Henrik

 Uncle Henrik (shown here as a young man working as a hired hand for the Nazi owner) was the lion tamer in the Circus Francesco. After the war in Poland, he became somewhat of a celebrity when he was the first person who successfully bred a lion with a tiger. The resulting cub is called a liger.

***

A year after I was supposed to go to Poland, our family received their second visit from a family member.

It was around Christmastime, and I had settled into going to the same school for the winter. One day I came home and found a stranger sitting at the kitchen table with Vati. In front of them stood a half-empty vodka bottle and two shot glasses. Vati was talking to the stranger in what I thought was Polish.

Mutti came from the livin groom and said, “Henrik, this is our second, Sonja.” She turned to me. “This is your uncle Henrik.”

I remembered that Vati had talked about his brother coming to visit from Poland, but had forgotten all about it.

I stretched out my hand and the stranger took it. “Hallo Sonja,” he said gravely.

Carmen and Josefa burst in after me, trailed by Franz. Mutti shooed me into the

living room and introduced my sisters to Uncle Henrik.

“And this is our son, Franz. He’s named after your father.”

Uncle Henrik rose and hugged Franz, who squirmed in the embrace of this stranger. When Henrik was about to sit down again, Mutti touched his arm. “Why don’t you and Colya go into the living room. I have to start supper now.”

Vati rose, and as he went through the open sliding doors into the living room, he stumbled against the edge of the door and mumbled something in polish. Uncle Henrik grabbed the bottle and the two glasses and followed him.

Mutti came after him. “Carmen, Sonja, Josefa, come here. You have homework to do. Eva, you come too.”

Uncle Henrik said something in Polish to Vati. “Franz, join us,” Vati called. “You’re the only man among all these women. You drink with us.”

Nine-year-old Franz stood in the doorway, not moving. Mutti took his arm and looked around him into the living room. “You will not give this child any vodka, Colya. You and Henrik can drink all you want, but Franz will stay here. He is a child, understand?”

Vati looked at Henrik who took another sip from his glass. “You women. Always meddling,” he mumbled and then slipped back into Polish. Soon he had forgotten all about it, and laughed and talked with Henrik while we sisters, and Franz, too, finished our homework, with Eva playing on the floor.

Mutti finished a large plate of open-faced sandwiched for us children and carried a smaller plate into the living room. We ate, listening to Vati and Uncle Henrik talk, hoping in vain to understand something.

After supper, Mutti got Eva ready for bed and shooed us off to sleep long before our usual bedtime. I heard Vati, Mutti and Uncle Henrik talk and laugh until I drifted off to sleep.

Uncle Henrik stayed a week. He was not talking much to us children, I assumed because he didn’t understand much German, but he was always friendly and sometimes a little too friendly, trying to hug and kiss us. Our parents never hugged or kissed us, so it seemed weird to me that a strange men, eve if he was an uncle, would do that. But somewhere deep inside I loved it!

 When Uncle Henry left, he gave Mutti several kielbasa hard sausages and other Polish food. I will never forget the wonderful taste of kielbasa in lentil soup, kielbasa sliced on a piece of bread, and kielbasa with sauerkraut.

I never saw Uncle Henry again after he left.

A Visit to Poland

 

I was eleven that year. One evening in November, after we settled down in winter quarters, I overheard Mutti and Vati talking.

Josefa and I were sitting at the kitchen table, finishing some homework, when Vati’s deep voice resonated through the small caravan home. “My sister would be delighted to have her namesake come and visit her.”

Josefa looked up from her math book and frowned at me. “What do they mean?” she mouthed.

I shrugged, but a knot formed in my stomach. Did my parents want to send me away? Maybe forever? I didn’t know how to live anywhere else but here in my family. Maybe Vati would go with me. Then it wouldn’t be so scary.

The next morning Mutti handed me my sandwich for lunch break. “Come right home from school today. We have to get your visa pictures made.”

I took the sandwich bag and stuffed it into my satchel. “Are you really going to send me to Poland?”

“It will be a great opportunity for you.” She opened the door. “Now go on or you’ll be late for school.”

“Will Vati or you go with me?”

“Don’t worry about that. Off with you to school.” She pointed to the outside.

I decided now wasn’t the time to discuss this and left. But the thoughts whirled around in my head. The way Mutti had answered my question indicated that I would go alone. I didn’t want to go to Poland alone. I didn’t know anybody in Poland. Why couldn’t I stay here, in our caravan, with my brothers and sisters? But if I’d say anything Mutti wouldn’t listen to me. She’d just tell me to shut up.

That day, in school, I tried to imagine what Poland would be like. All I could think of was a cold, rainy and dark place with lots of cobblestones and no trees.

I made myself hurry home, even though I would rather have dawdled. Mutti was waiting with her coat on and purse in her hand. “There you are. Let’s go.”

I dropped my satchel onto the kitchen bench and hurried after her, wondering what it would be like to have a picture taken.

The photographer took me to a small, dark room. He had me sit on a hard stool and told me not to smile. A flash made me squint, and then it was all over.

The photographer escorted us out. “I’ll have the photos ready in two weeks. It’s been a pleasure.”

Nothing much happened the next few days. Vati and Mutti didn’t talk about Poland anymore. I was relieved. Maybe they had forgotten.

One day, when I came home, Mutti said. “The photos for your visa are here.” She showed me a set of four black and white pictures. They showed my face and my too short cropped hair. I thought I looked ugly. Maybe Aunt Sonja wouldn’t like me when I arrived in Poland and would send me back again.

Vati sat on the living room sofa, writing in some papers. “My sister will be so glad to have a young person around,” he said. “I’ll mail the papers as soon as I’m done here. Then all we have to do is wait.”

I hoped getting the visa would take a really long time. Maybe it would take the rest of the winter, and by spring we’d be traveling again. Those papers might never reach us, and I’d stay home.

One day in February I came home and heard my parent arguing before I opened the door to the caravan home. I stopped on the steps and listened.

“I tell you, if we send her, we’ll never see her again,” Mutti’s strident voice came through the door.

Vati’s voice, quieter and lower, answered, “I promised my sister we’d send her. She’ll make sure our child will come back.”

“What can she do when the government refuses to let Sonja return? A month ago I wouldn’t have worried, but now…” Mutti’s words trailed off.

“Maybe you’re right. We could wait and see what happens. If the laws lighten up again, we can always send her later.”

“That’s an idea. I’m sure your sister will understand.” Mutti sounded relieved. “Maybe we’ll send her next winter.”

My heart grew lighter. At least for now I was safe. I decided that now was the moment to interrupt and charged into the caravan home.

My parents never said another word to me about it, and they never sent me to Poland.

Brigitte

Brigitte, Mutti’s sister was nine years younger than Mutti. When I was very small, right after the war, Brigitte once came to live with us in our tiny caravan. By then Mutti had Carmen, Josefa, and me, and my little brother was a newborn. Brigitte was supposed to help out with us children. But it didn’t last long before both sisters lost their patience with each other and Brigitte left again.

She rarely wrote after that and never visited again until I was a teenager and we had left the carnival circuit. Mutti had separated from Vati and lived with us girls and baby Michael in an apartment.

One day, a knock came at the door. Eva, my little sister, opened the door and a strange woman with light brown hair and blue eyes, and obviously pregnant, asked for our Mutti. Mutti called her Brigitte and pulled her into the apartment.

Brigitte had nowhere to go, so she lived in my older sister’s room for a few weeks, while Mutti and she tried to find her a job and a place of her own. Eventually Brigitte found work at the hospital in Wetzlar, a few miles away, and moved out. She never contacted my mother again, and we still don’t know what happened to her. Mutti is 91 now. When I visited her last, I asked about her sister. Mutti didn’t know whether she was still alive or where she lived. I don’t think either sister cared too much for the other.

A few years earlier, when I was twelve, we had another family member visiting. I’ll talk about that soon. Now I’m getting ready to take out my own little surprise visitor, Liesel, and her sisters!

Chicken, Potatoes, and Raisins!

Oh, the joys of eating chicken! Chicken Cordon Bleu with melty sweet Swiss cheese and crisp crumbs on the outside is one of my favorite chicken dishes. Chicken in yellow gravy, made from a can of creamy chicken soup and poured over potatoes can still make my mouth salivate.

That day so long ago, we ate chicken and self-picked dandelion greens with young nettles, and it seemed every bit as delicious to the little girl I was, as an expertly prepared Chicken Cordon Bleu would taste today.

After we ate, Mutti saved the rest of the chicken. The next day, she cut it into small pieces and heated them in a yellow gravy. We had boiled potatoes with it. What a delight!

We had potatoes every day. They were cheap and grew well in Germany after the war. I never got tired of them, and I still love them.

That evening, supper consisted of raisin bread with margarine and an apple. Carmen said, “Yuck! I hate slimy raisins,” and picked them out.

“Don’t be so dumb,” Mutti said. “Raisins are good for you.”

But Carmen pushed her little pile of raisins away.

Josefa watched with wide eyes. “Yucky,” she said, and picked out her raisins, too.

Mutti said, “Little brats.” She picked up Carmen’s raisins and ate one. “Oh, well. More for the rest of us.”

I, too, poked a raisin out of my slice of bread and tried it. Carmen was right. They were slimy and gushy and icky. But I wanted to make Mutti happy. I swallowed it.

Mutti smiled. “At least Sonja eats them,” she said. “She’s a good eater.”

Pride swelled my breast. I smiled at my sisters across the table.

Vait took a swallow from his coffee cup. “She eats so much, but never gains weight. Maybe she’s sick.”

I wasn’t worried about being sick. Mutti was pleased with me, and Vati was thinking about me. I resolved to always be a good eater, so Mutti would approve.

Today I have learned to love raisins, especially in hot oatmeal. And I do have to rein in my appetite so I can stay healthy!

Greens

One sunny autumn morning, when I was maybe four or five, Mutti turned to Carmen and said, “Watch Franz. I’ll have to find something green for lunch.”

She called Josefa and me, put on her gloves, even though it was warm outside, grabbed her shopping basket, and left. We hurried after her in the morning sunlight.

Mutti strode along the street of the little village we held our carnival in that week. We passed a big building that may have been the city hall. Long slats of wood were all over it, and they almost hid the big burnt hole in the upper story. People climbed all over the wood, working on the broken bricks.

When the sidewalk ended, Mutti turned into a path marked with grassy ruts. Josefa and I hurried to keep up with her. We tried not to stumble on the uneven ground. The damp grasses left cold streaks on my bare legs.

We reached a small pond, and Mutti stopped. Stinging nettles grew in profusion by the pond, their dark green fleshy leaves crowding out other grasses. Mutti checked her gloves and broke off the smaller nettles, piling them into the basket. Josefa was reaching out to copy Mutti, but Mutti slapped her hand away.

“Don’t do that,” she said. “They’ll sting you.”

“Yeah,” I said. “You don’t know anything.”

Josefa kicked my leg. I screamed and hit her. She started crying.

Mutti ignored us.

I ran from my sister, being careful not to touch the nettles. Josefa quit crying, sat in the grass, and played with a dandelion.

When the basket was almost full, Mutti turned toward the meadow on the other side of the path. She picked the dandelion leaves and piled them on top of the nettles. Some of the blooms had turned a gossamer gray and Mutti left them alone. When I picked a gray one and blew on it, the gray dissolved into many tiny parachutes, which floated softly in the breeze.

Josefa and I ran around the meadow, picking dandelions and blowing them, until Mutti yelled at us. We trudged back after her past the bombed out city hall to the grassy commons, where Vati had already put up the back and sides of the shooting gallery in front of our caravan.

Vati stopped working, picked something white from the ground next to the half-erected shooting gallery, and followed us to the caravan home. He held up a dead chicken, his broad hands grasping it firmly by the feet. Its head dangled from under its white, feathered body, wings half-spread. The eyes were closed and its beak stood open. I thought the chicken looked sad.

“I exchanged this for free tickets,” Vati said and smiled.

Mutti put down her basket and clapped her hands.

“We’ll have a feast today,” she said and took the chicken. She shooed Carmen and Franz from the caravan, but left the door open. Franz sat down by the steps and played in the dirt. Josefa and I watched Mutti.

Mutti put the chicken in the wash bowl. Its head dangled over the rim and she tucked that into the bowl too. The feet were sticking straight up. After she heated water on the coal stove she took the chicken outside and poured the boiling water over it. Then she left and let it sit on the caravan steps for a while.

Josefa and I turned to play with Franz who drove an imaginary car through the dirt, making car noises.

When I looked up again, Mutti sat on the steps, plucking the feathers off the chicken. They fell in an untidy heap next to the caravan home’s wheels. When she was done, she cut the belly of the chicken open and dug out the insides.

I watched, eyes and mouths open.

Josefa joined me. “Yuck,” she said.

Mutti pulled out the intestines. “Most of this isn’t good to eat. But the rest will taste great.” She looked at Josefa. “If you don’t want it, we’ll eat it for you.”

“I want it, I want it,” Josefa said, but she sounded doubtful.

Mutti rose and took the chicken inside.

For lunch we had potatoes with green stuff, made from the greens we and Mutti had picked that morning, and parts of the chicken.

Carmen and Josefa each got a foot. Mutti showed them how to strip the scaly skin off the foot and lower leg and eat the meaty gristle from between the bones. I got the head. I cracked it open and ate the brains out of it. It was delicious, much better than the greens we helped Mutti pick.

***

Many years later, in my spacious kitchen in America, I remind Mutti of the chicken head. “I couldn’t eat that now. But then it tasted delicious.”

“I remember,” Mutti says. “We did what we had to. My children never went hungry.” She sighs and helps me finish washing the dishes.

Spinach Part Two

Margot sat in front of the mess on her table, not moving. If she’d try again, she’d throw it up again. But what else could she do? Eventually she took the spoon again, scooped up a fresh, smaller part of the mess and swallowed it quickly. Her stomach heaved, but she took a deep breath and it stayed down.

Mutti glanced up from her paper. “There you go. Now eat the rest and don’t be so stubborn.”

Margot didn’t dare to eat another bite. The spinach in her stomach felt as if it wanted to crawl up her throat. There must be something wrong with her. Other people ate spinach, why couldn’t she? She hung her head.

Brigitte’s cries from the hallway faded. She must have fallen asleep again.

Margot stared at the spinach for an eternity. Finally the front door slammed.

Mutti rose. “Is that you, Max?”

Max came in. A raindrop glistened on his nose. “Hi Elfriede, hi Margot.” He put his lunchbox onto the table and kissed Mutti on the cheek. “What’s going on? It’s after four. What’s Margot doing still eating?”

Mutti’s forehead creased. She glanced at Margot, eyes hard and cold like ice. “You know how she is. She’s determined not to eat her spinach, no matter what. And I’m determined that this time, for once, she will.”

“But I don’t like it,” Margot wailed.

Max came closer, staring at Margot’s plate. He pointed. “Is that throw-up?”

Margot shrunk tighter into her chair. In spite of her efforts, hot tears squeezed from her eyes. “I’m sorry.  I couldn’t help it. It just came up again. I tried to eat it. I really tried.”

Without another word, Max turned, took Mutti by the elbow, and pulled her into the hallway. The kitchen door snapped shut.

Margot swallowed. Maybe this was her chance to rinse the mess into the sink. But if Mutti would catch her again, she’d beat her with the wooden spoon, besides making her eat it. She couldn’t risk it. She stared at her plate without seeing it. Her bottom was hurting from sitting in the hard chair for so long.

The door to the hallway opened. Max came in.

Faintly, Margot heard Mutti in Brigitte’s room, talking to her in that soothing, sing-song voice she used for the baby.

Max marched up to her, took her by the elbow, and pulled her out of the chair. “Go into your room and don’t come out again for the rest of the day. I’ll bring you a sandwich in a while.”

Margot turned to him. “And I don’t have to eat that spinach anymore?”

“No, you don’t. Your mother will be fine in the morning. Just stay out of her sight today.”

Margot threw her arms around his waist. “Thank you! Thanks so much.”

Max disengaged himself from her embrace. “Hurry up now. I’ll see you later.”

Margot tiptoed past Brigitte’s open bedroom door and gently shut the door to her room behind herself. She threw herself on the bed and buried her head into her pillow. She might be a bad girl because she couldn’t please her mother, but if she ever had children, she would never make them eat stuff they didn’t like, especially not spinach.

***

And she never did.