PREPARATION FOR LIFE
My grandparents influenced me in many life matters. Among important things I learned from them was how to handle money wisely. They taught me to take a penny and stretch it to ten—a skill that prepared me for the work I do now.
Like so many, we had very little after the war. I went shopping with Oma every week. We wrote a list and visited four stores. In each store we priced the items and recorded the prices. Then we went back to the store that had the best price. Whatever money was left, we hid under the table between the wash pans and saved it.
At five years of age I learned to save. Oma got me play money and showed me how to count it. I stared into her twinkly green-brown eyes as she taught me, loving every moment with her. She made pretend grocery lists of things for me to buy with the money and a game of seeing how much I could save. I played shopping with my little cash register for hours, lining up make-believe money and dolls and pretending to take them to the store to buy things.
Oma also gave me an allowance of ten cents every week, as long as I was a good girl. She said, “We’re going to spend five cents and save five.” We went to the store with five cents, and she helped me learn how to spend it. She pointed out how value increased through wise choices: “You can get ten of these candies, or five of these. Make sure you get the most for your money.”
There were no better people to teach me life skills than my beloved Oma and Opa. Oma taught me how to set the table—knife here, fork there. She taught me good manners and was always proud of me. When we walked down the street and met someone, I had to curtsy. She instilled a strong sense of goodness in me, saying, “This is wrong, but that is right,” and she showed me what to do.
My grandparents loved me and gave me a wonderful sense of security, but somewhere in my heart I knew something was missing. Things weren’t quite what they were supposed to be, because I wasn’t with my parents.
As much as I wanted a mommy, I especially felt my daddy’s absence. I looked at him and my mother in photographs and thought how handsome he was. I could feel that he had adored me, and my heart ached to be with him. I stared at his picture and wished I could see him. I didn’t understand why he never came to visit. My mother came only once, when I was four years old, and I remember her pushing my stroller. I was so happy, thinking, I’ve got my mommy! I’ve got my mommy! I knew this was the way it was supposed to be.
When I was five and a half, Ingeborg sent me a parcel from Canada. Oma always spoke positively of her. “Look!” she said, handing me the package. “Your mommy sent you these sweaters.” Out of my mouth came the words, “Why would she send me all these sweaters if she doesn’t love me?” My young mind had grasped the truth.
SCHOOL DAYS
Kindergarten was just around the corner from us in a Protestant church run by Catholic nuns. I liked it, but it made me nervous. The nuns who taught there were strong, loud women and made me feel uneasy. It cost money for parents to send children to kindergarten, and for that reason I was only there in the morning. At noon Oma picked me up, because in the afternoon we only had lunch and a nap.
On the day Oma enrolled me in grade one I felt a particular twinge of sadness. I loved my grandparents, but I was almost ashamed that I didn’t have parents. Everyone else was with their mom and dad, but I was with my grandmother.
I was afraid I wouldn’t do well in school. In some ways I felt stunted or incomplete—unable to move ahead without my mother and father. I was different because my parents didn’t want me and I had to be raised by my grandparents.
In grade one we learned to read, write and do math. Then in grades two and three, we learned to print. Math in Germany was about four years ahead of the Canadian curriculum.
Every day when I went home Oma helped me with homework. She always pumped encouragement and delight into her “little precious one.” At times she taught me songs she wrote, and we did little dances together.
Another joy I experienced with my grandparents was life at the store they owned. After the war, many people didn’t have electricity. Opa, being an electrician, fixed their lamps and restored electricity to homes that were bombed out. Oma got up at three o’clock in the morning and pulled a little wagon to the next town. At the garbage dump she filled it with scrap metal, which Opa used for making lamps. He installed wiring in people’s homes and sold them his homemade lamps.
HOME AT THE STORE
My grandparents were really hard workers and made a million dollars in 13 years because ours was one of the busiest stores in town. Opa sold his lamps there, and Oma tended the counter. She was conscious of her appearance. Her hair had turned white when she was 30 years old from the traumas of war. “People don’t want to see an old lady behind the counter,” she quipped, and she dyed her hair dark.
I spent a lot of time at the back of the store. It was home to me. Oma’s kitchen was there, with space for me to play. Some days Oma wore a path from the storefront to the kitchen, where she cooked and baked. The aroma of strudel baking always filled the air. I also recall her making liver and onions once a month. When she made it, it tasted wonderful!
There was a Murphy bed in a room between the storefront and the kitchen. Sometimes we slept there to deter burglars. It wasn’t uncommon for Oma to spot thieves and run out the door and down the street after them.
She was often alone in the store, looking after things by herself while Opa worked at someone’s house. I felt sorry for her. Even then I wondered how she managed all her tasks and me.
I was mesmerized by Oma’s stories about the war. One particular story of running for cover gave her nightmares.
WAR AND DANGER
Before bombers came, she said, two warning sirens sounded. At the first one, people had five minutes to get to the bunker. On one occasion when the siren wailed, she ran to the bunker, but some friends who lived on the same street didn’t hear it. They didn’t run for cover until the second siren. By that time, they only had three minutes to get to safety. Panicked, they ran to the shelter, but it was too late. The plane carrying the bomb roared overhead. Oma turned to look just as the bomb dropped. Its heat liquefied the asphalt, and the street became a molten river that buckled over the people like a wave, swallowing them and burning them alive. Oma heard their dying screams and watched in horror as they disappeared.
Each time she told this story she relived the grief of losing her friends and being the only one to survive. As a little girl I listened spellbound, hoping my presence would comfort her.
Oma told me story after story, crying and feeling pain for those who had suffered. Whenever Oma could, she tried to alleviate suffering. I remember how many times she reached out to others, especially to one single mom whose son, Rainer, was my best friend.
I never learned what happened to Rainer’s father. Perhaps he had died in the war, but I felt very sad for Rainer because he didn’t have a daddy. My grandparents used to help his mom however they could—with groceries or electrical needs. Rainer and I played together when his mother came over. I remember her wiping tears as she and Oma talked. Meanwhile Rainer and I made great, long games of hopscotch on the sidewalk with chalk—a luxury—and hoped it wouldn’t rain to wash away our drawings.
Even though my life seemed to be near-perfect and the night of the Berlin Wall terror was behind us, danger still prevailed in Berlin. At our country house, my grandparents were always alert, not knowing when a Russian soldier might appear. Fortunately, Oma’s premonitions always warned us in time, and Opa never questioned them.
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