NEIN, DANKE
Two things happened yesterday. It was blustery and windy but with the sun bright on the white houses on and off. (You won‘t believe how irksome it is to keep uncapitalizing White House’s, always with an apostrophe s, because of the spell checker’s political correctness, a problem I can leave in Greece.)
But the white and blue whitecaps were beautiful beating against the black rocks of the shore. And I haven‘t emphasized the potted plants in Naousa enough. The hills of Poros are barren, the forests that were once there denuded thousands of years ago, and there are even very few gardens.
But there are pots of every size outside every house. So I‘ll show you a few of them scattered through my next story.
The big event yesterday for me was connecting with my past of 60 years ago. Almost all the major events in my life, even times when I thought I was in charge, have been chance events. And one of the biggest was being shipped to Germany by the US Army at the age of 21. It was at a time when I didn‘t know what to do with my life, and certainly didn‘t want to go to graduate school to which everyone I knew was consigned and where I later spent many uncomfortable years. I thought having a selective service number meant that I would have to serve in the US Army sometime, so without any advice from anyone I volunteered for the draft, but first I spent a glorious three month summer after graduation hitch-hiking around the United States, coast to coast and up and down. No man I know my age has served in the army, but every man I know my age spent years afraid of being sent to Vietnam and trying to evade the army. I didn‘t. I was done by that time.
So I chose to volunteer for the draft, but the Army, which could have sent me to two miserable years at Fort Sill or Fort Benning or some other fort (The Army map of the United States has no cities or states or highways, only a scattering of forts where lifers move from one assignment to another) chose to send me to Germany to the town of Aschaffenburg, on the beautiful Main River just south of Frankfurt. I‘ll save a description of Aschaffenburg and those years until I get there next week (if I can remember it).
My problem with those years in Aschaffenburg is that I can barely remember them. I can barely remember anything of my life. Kathe, who could tell you that the woman who sold us a teapot at a yard sale ten years ago was wearing a turquoise sweater with black ivy knitted in, was my memory, she never forgot a color or a sweater, and now my memory has suddenly vanished. It isn‘t early onset dementia unless I have been demented all my life, which is possible, but I haven‘t noticed it.
But the thing I do remember about Aschaffenburg was renting a room in town, not allowed by the army, which didn‘t like fraternization, and spending all my free time there with books and a typewriter. But the best part of the room was the family who lived upstairs and made me feel part of their family for two years at Sunday dinners, at outings, in their home. That was 60 years ago. Thirty years ago my son and I were in Germany and we visited Aschaffenburg and found the house and the family was still there, the girls grown up and about to marry. But I was sure they would be gone now. I was sure the parents would have died but the girls might still be around. They were lovely little girls, Margit, about ten and little Dorothee, eight. I was going to find the house and see if I could find where they had moved.
But when I mentioned this to Wolfgang, he had a better idea. Google. I hadn‘t thought of Google, it is part of my abandoned American experience. And anyway, the girls both must be married with different names. Google didn‘t help me. Much maligned Facebook did. When I entered Dorothee van Wurzbach, there she was, 70 years old or so. For the rest of yesterday we were in touch. Dorothee has been married twice, but for some reason has kept her maiden name. Her second husband died three days after Kathe, both of cancer. She doesn‘t live in Aschaffenburg any more, but not far away near Wurzburg, and her sister Margit, who lives right outside Aschaffenburg, was coming to visit her in an hour. Maria, the mother, lives with Dorothee and is 96 and unable to walk. Margit will drive me to Wurzburg. Little Dorothee, almost unrecognizable as am I, she sent me a picture from 30 years ago, was delighted that I was coming. All of a sudden my quixotic return to Aschaffenburg, a city that has probably changed so much that I would be lost in it, was going to be a warm and friendly visit.
Wolfgang beamed when I told him how smart he was. I showed him Dorothee‘s Facebook photograph, and then when I looked closer and stretched it to enlarge it, I noticed writing around it. I had seen that kind of writing before on Facebook. Vaccinated and Proud Of It. But this didn‘t say, proudly vaccinated, it said, Imfung Nein, Danke. Vaccination No, Thank You. And I knew that little Dorothee was going to cause me a problem or I was going to cause her a problem, but it turned that there is no problem at all because we care about each other.
I have Todd‘s super strength mask and I am determined to not take it off for my entire visit to Aschaffenburg to protect Dorothee and her 96 year old mother, Maria, and anyone else I might come in contact with in case I was asymptomatic, and, on second thought, to protect my 84 year old self.
And then a third thing happened, Efi invited me to supper with Wolfgang. We had marvelous octopus spaghetti mixed with fried onions and balsamic sauce, a special treat, with Greek salad, boiled beets and lots of beer. And I went to bed at peace with myself and the world.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 