Academe (where a weathered historian shares)
My grandma Berta died a couple months after I turned four years old. And yet I have two “memories” of her that define her for me. The first is the combination of the smell of freshly baked cinnamon rolls and a warm kitchen. That is my own memory.
The second is the fact that she traveled on her own with a little baby from the old country to the new country, because grandpa Paul traveled in advance. That is a “memory” based on what my dad told me; it became fact and memory through the retellings and through verification from Ellis Island records. They arrived on July 20, 1909, on the ship Kaiser Wilhelm II from Bremen. According to the ship’s manifest she was 19 years old and Frances (“Franciszka”) was 11 months old, and their final destination was Raleigh, West Virginia, where grandpa Paul was.
What guts. What heart.
Baking and traveling, two things that have become significant in my life and allow me to feel connected to her. I love traveling, especially on my own, and I’m more successful baking in the oven than cooking on top of the stove. But that’s me.
My grandma’s story and life encompassed much, much more (and many more children!). For one small example, which I bring up because there is a photo, she had friends in the rural farming community in central Wisconsin.
Imagine the conversations!
With Critters, It’s Personal
What I love most about dogs is how pure they are. Dogs simply are.
And sometimes by simply being who they are, they reflect back to us who we are.
For instance. There is the way I think I look in a photo, which Ande demonstrates here without effort, because she is gorgeous.
And then there is how I actually look in a photo, which again Ande demonstrates effortlessly…