On Mothers

Now that my childhood memoir is about to be published, my mother is a lot on my mind. My mother, who now is 91 years and is still strong and healthy, lives in Stuttgart, Germany. Mutti, as I still call her, was the most powerful influence in my young life. But even as a little girl, torn between loyalty to her and my own perception of what is truth, I couldn't always agree with her or do what she expected of me.

Mutti was born a few years before Hitler ascended to power, in the most important city of Europe, Berlin. Her father, who passed away when she was only five, was Jewish, and her mother a well-to-do Aryan. With her black eyes and dark hair, Mutti stood out from the other Germans around her. She struggled for self-validation all her life, but never quite was able to see herself as equal to everybody around her.

In order to come to grips with Mutti's disregard of affection and praise, I have written the story of her life as a novel. This novel, which I call Walk on a Wire, has received the distinguished Eaton award for best unpublished manuscript of the year, but has not been published yet. In this story I tell of my mother's struggle to stay alive in the Third Reich. She eventually hid in a circus, where she met my father, the rightful owner of the circus. After the war, Mutti and my father were married. They kept the circus for a few years more, but then had to abandon it in favor of a tiny carnival. With a merry-go-round and a shooting gallery, they traveled the small towns in central Germany, trying to keep their rapidly growing family fed.

And my memoir, Carnival Girl, is the story of that life, as seen through the eyes of one little girl.

I will post bits and pieces of that life, parts that didn't make it into the book and parts I had forgotten, on this blog. I'll also be talking about forgiveness and grace and the miracles that happen in spite of the mistakes we make.