German Letter #3

I really enjoyed my day off – it involved watching a moive, going to the park, and playing delightful little pretending games with 3 energetic children. Surprisingly, I got to bed fairly early and was somewhat refreshed when the alarm rang at the usual 5:30am. I tried to be really quiet, because Nathan didn’t have work till 11 and Giulianna didn’t have school. To my dismay, Giovanna got up at 6am to make a pancake breakfast. We chatted quietly as we mixed the batter and made the syrup (no maple syrup in Germany – the substitute is a sugar, water, molasses and maple flavoring concoction which doesn’t taste as bad as it sounds). The whole breakfast was simply scrumptious!

It was actually a little sunny when I got to the bus stop (which was practically empty), even though I was still cold with my sweater and fleece jacket. The lab wasn’t as full today either – everyone was getting ready for an inspection by the new boss that was scheduled for that morning. I sat at my desk and began reading the 1st volume of that chemistry manual again. It made a little more sense this time. The inspection passed through quickly, and a few min. later Mr. Weick called me over to do some more theory. We went over about ¾ of the power point presentation, and this time it was a little easier to understand. After 1 ¾ hrs he told me we would take a little break, finish up the theory and then go to lunch.

Well, the break kept getting longer and longer until the group I was supposed to go to lunch with left. Lunch was only fair today – they didn’t have any main meals that I liked (they both involved some kind of cabbage), so I just had some noodle salad. When I got back to the lab Mr. Weick finished up the theory with me, (he only got interrupted once by a phone call from his wife. It was cute!) and gave me a little oral quiz at the end. Luckily I was able to answer all of his questions correctly.

As a final job I was asked to get the Festkörperzahl for resin W1055, and then I was allowed to leave. It was nice to be greeted by the warm air and sunshine when I left the building. I caught my bus and made it back to the Northrup’s house. I spent the rest of my afternoon helping Giovanna make baptism invitations for Giulianna who is getting baptized in a few weeks… they look really cute! Anyway, this weekend is sure to generate another story… we will see if it is a horror story or not…

Love and miss you all, keep those emails coming please!!!

Margaret

Okay, I didn’t actually get to send this off before the weekend really started, so I’ll just tell you the rest now as well. I had my weekend all planned out – Sat. morning I would visit two of our old neighbors (former and aged), then Sat. evening I would go to my friend Verena’s house, spend the night there, go to church on Sun, and then get home somehow. Well, when I scheduled my visit with Frau Stahl, it seemed that she had my visit all planned out for me. She wanted me to get there at about 10:30, then we would go out to lunch, then we would go back to her house for coffee and cake (no, I don’t drink coffee, that’s just what this little snack between lunch and dinner is called). Well, I certainly hadn’t planned to spend my whole Sat. with her. She is somewhere around 75 years old I think and I had no idea what we would talk about for the whole time. I told her I couldn’t stay that long, and said I had to leave around…(quick thinking)… 2pm (what was I thinking!?!?). She was very disappointed. After I hung up I thought about what I had said. I would still be spending 3 ½ hrs. with her, which seemed like a lot. I wanted to visit two other people on Sat. morning, and now I certainly couldn’t fit them all in. I decided to call her back and tell her I had to leave even earlier. Well, it took me 4 days to work up the guts to do it. When I finally did call (late Friday afternoon), I got confused and flustered, and allowed myself to be talked out of my plans. When I got off the phone, I sighed inwardly and prepared myself for a very trying 3 ½ hr. visit.

Friday evening Giovanna invited Judith over so we could watch a movie together. She put the kids to bed, and I went online to try and find directions to Verena’s house. I was so distracted I didn’t notice the time pass… Judith came and I let her in. After about 10 min. we both started wondering what had happened to Giovanna. I peeked inside the kid’s room – there she was, fast asleep on the floor next to Marco. Lucas wasn’t asleep yet though – he asked me what I was doing, and I told him to go to sleep. A few min. later Giovanna came out and we all laughed… turns out we needed to get the invitations for Giulianna’s baptism ready, so instead of watching a movie we stayed up till 1am printing invitations.

Well, 6:30 came much to early Saturday morning. I packed my backpack with overnight gear and eventually set off for Unterkohlfurth, my old home. It felt like yesterday that I had taken the CE65 home from school and walked the 2 km down the wooded path to where we used to live, and yet I felt a simple joy just to be back again. I remembered everything… the smell of the pines, the rustling of the leaves, the breathtaking view. I arrived at Frau Stahl’s house at 10:45am. After a warm hand shake Frau Stahl took me into her living room. First she gave me some gummy bears for my siblings, and then she took out some cookies for me to enjoy while we chatted. I was surprised at how easy it was. I don’t even really remember what we were talking about, but it wasn’t really boring or anything.

Around 11:45 we were ready to go to the restaurant for lunch. She had to move very slowly, she walks with a crutch and has had countless operations on her knees and everything. I felt helpful doing even the littlest things for her, like picking up her keys when they fell, or opening the car door. I felt young and healthy. She looked paler than I remembered, and frailer. I was slightly apprehensive when I got into the car, I had no idea how well she could drive. Well, she drives stick, and she never switched gears fast enough. The engine would start making a very loud revving noise, and she wouldn’t be able to hear it. She’d just keep driving, and eventually she would switch to a better gear. The other problem was that she drove pretty slowly… I was worried people behind us would get impatient and run into us from the back.

Anyway, we did get there safely. The restaurant was situated on the top of the mountain just outside of Cronenberg that overlooks the city Wuppertal. We went inside, ordered apple juice, and glanced through the menu. I knew exactly what I wanted: Schnitzel with French fries and salad. Frau Stahl also got a Schnizel with mushroom sauce on it. It wasn’t long before I had a steaming golden Schnizel sitting in front of me. It was really good. Still, the conversation didn’t really flag much – luckily Frau Stahl is a talker. The quaintest thing she asked me was “Doesn’t Texas have lots of Indians in it?” I declined dessert… schnitzel is very filling. She took me back, and I told her I would be visiting Frau Schön soon, but again she looked so disappointed I knew I had to stay at least a few more min. (it turned out to be ½ hr). As she talked I began to feel really sad for her. She lives very alone and secluded. She said she wished we were still there, because she thinks the people that live there now are just weird because they always have their blinds down and closed. She liked looking into our windows, enjoyed talking to us every once in a while, and always appreciated it when Mom asked her if she could bring her anything from the store. She told me she had no friends, and no one that she could really talk to. Then she elaborated on all of her health problems, and I wouldn’t switch places with her for the world. I finally knew I had to go, and she asked me to come again sometime. I half said yes… I told her my schedule is pretty unsure, and that if I could come again I would. My heart almost cried out loud as I watched her wave to me from her door step as a walked away.

Well, the Schöns did lighten me up a bit. They had their grandchildren there when I arrived (their grandchildren live just up the street), and they had gotten soooo big! There was even a new one… Felix… that I hadn’t seen yet. That visit was also fun… we chatted, drank apple juice, and ate more cookies. I was only able to spend about an hour with them before I knew it was time to leave. I gathered my things, gave them all hugs, and ran down to the CE64 bus stop, again just like old times. I caught the bus, and nervously waited till we got to Solingen. I saw my bus just ahead of us and prayed I would still be able to catch it. When we stopped, I dashed out of the bus and hurdled into the other one. I was safe! I had no idea were the bus would end up, but I knew I had to get out at the last stop to get my next one.

Turns out that I ended up at Schloßburg, a castle that we had visited a few times while we were still living in Germany. It was all more beautiful that I remembered. The sun was shining (thank goodness!!), it was kind of warm, the trees were so green, and everything so familiar. I passed the old typical German shops, houses and restaurants that lined the street to find the next bus stop. I did end up finding that bus stop, but to my disappointment the 653 only came once an hour and I had just missed it. It was about 4:15 – I wandered along the river and down to the small playground that is directly under the rope tow that goes to the castle. Everything was so peaceful; I listened to the birds and watched the water flow silently down its banks. I got tired of that after a while, so I ambled down the side streets, walking and thinking things. I watched two ducks fight their way upstream, then turn around and glide away.

Finally, the bus did come. I started to get really nervous now, because this was the shakiest part of my planning. I didn’t really know how to get to Verena’s house from the bus stop – all I had was her address; I knew her street was somewhere near the bus stop, but I couldn’t tell exactly where. I reached the stop, got out, and went up to the bus driver to ask him where I should go. To my relief he directed me to the next street, and told me it should be along there somewhere. I did find the house eventually… I had to ask directions again from another lady, but I got there. It was just awesome – I hugged Verena and started talking right away. We basically talked the whole evening till 11pm. It was so nice to just talk… I caught up on her life, and she caught up on mine (at least a little bit).

I was exhausted when I finally closed my eyes, and still tired when the alarm rang at 6:45 to get us ready for church. We had some more cake for breakfast (Verena had made a giant heart-shaped cake for her Dad for father’s day). So, eventually we decided we needed to get a good picture of us both together during the morning. I was so dumb I had forgotten my camera at the Northrups, so we used the Helzer’s. Tim (one of her 3 brothers) took 3 pictures of us, and they were all horrible (one of the many things Verena and I have in common is that we are not photogenic). Church was really good – I had picked the right Sunday to come, because there were lots of other visitors from other wards there – the stake young men presidency was there and the high council with some of his family. I got to see Sis. Stein, the Büschers and their adorable daughter Elizabeth, Eva Hoppe (a girl I used to know from young womens), and a few other people that I never would have gotten to see if I hadn’t been there on that Sunday.

We had a nice lesson in relief society about recognizing temptation – it was given by a blind sister who used a brail computer type thing to read from the manual. She also had a dog with her; I thought it was pretty cool. Sunday school was interesting – Christian Helzer, Verena’s brother, gave the lesson on home teaching. It went really fast. Sacrament meeting was really good as well – Brother David from Duisburg gave a talk on friendship… he said women usually develop this friendship by talking a lot. Verena and I looked at each other and smiled. Brother Barluschke gave a talk and then the high council Brother Stein…

Okay, it’s mon. night and I don’t have time to finish this yet – quick sum up: Giovanna just had a mouth operation and is to sick to do anything (looks like a chipmunk), so I didn’t have time to work on this today (doing dishes and putting kids to bed etc.) The rest will come tomorrow.

Love and miss you all! Margaret