Djebel Ouach. Nanna is the little girl with short hair. Maman on her right. Pépé Honninger in front with bottle of champagne. Debbah with hat, third from left.
April, 1956
One of these bumpy, square-wheeled rides led us along to Easter celebrations. Following the yearly tradition, and in spite of the war, Europeans who lived in or nearby Constantine continued to spend Easter Monday at Djebel Ouach—a breezy plateau crowned with stands of oaks, pines, and eucalypti that hugged five artificial lakes supplying water to the plains region.
Extended families, neighbors, and friends gathered in small groups seated on blankets spread over patchy grass. After the midday meal, the picnickers doused the coals, wrapped up the leftover food, exchanged news, played cards or Boules, fished, or took a nap. The best time was after siesta, at about four, when people danced to the music of accordions, drums, and trumpets. Pépé Honninger pulled out castanets from his pocket and accompanied the band with a gusto he’d never show otherwise. My enthusiasm was such that I’d grab Zizou’s or Mimi’s hands and we’d shuffle or hop as we mimicked the dancing adults.
At the close of one of these Easter lunches, Pépé Honninger grabbed his fishing pole, lures and worms and Maman clapped her hands. “It is time for a nap, les enfants.”
Under Papa’s rule, we took our siestas when he took his. Being almost twelve and the oldest, I had to set the example. So I lay flat on my back, arms along my body, and breathed slowly, willing my lids to become heavy with sleep. However, the air vibrated with repressed energy.
Flying insects wove darts of light as they flitted from sun to shade. I inhaled the bitter tang of crushed weeds, the sharp essence of pines, and the eucalypti’s delicate fragrance. I had slipped into a cozy half doze—low-droned bits of conversations dissolving into the breeze off the lakes—when a bug landed on my cheek. I slapped it, sat up, and no longer willing to remain still, slipped on my sandals, taking care not to wake my father. I adjusted my shorts and sleeveless top and strolled toward the trees. Tall grasses of pale gold tickled my legs. Small animals scurried away. Buzzing insects dashed from dots of sun to spots of shade, looking like fireflies. Grasshoppers hopped, revealing dark red wings, and cicadas played like violins nursing a cold. A thrilling sense of freedom put a spring in my step, taking me farther into the trees.
A gnarled pine tree rose in my way, its trunk blanketed in dark-brown moss with long thin stems crowned with tiny pods. In one spot, the bark oozed sap that congealed into beads of translucent amber. I pinched a blob between index and thumb and brought it to my nose. It was sticky and smelled of the gumdrops Pépé Honninger gave us for our sore throats. I put my tongue to it and tasted turpentine.
While I wiped my fingers on a tuft of grass at the foot of the tree, my eyes followed the moss-covered trunk to its bristled crown. What fun it would be to look down at people from high up.
The trunk’s slight incline made it easy to scale, and soon I clung to it several feet above the ground. The moss felt soft against my skin.
We had just studied moss at school, and I wondered what type it was.
Strange. Shouldn’t it be growing on the north side of the tree, like lichen? Why was it growing all around?
Another thought followed. Isn’t this place too dry for moss to be growing?
Curious, I hugged the trunk with both my legs and left hand and, with my other hand, plucked a tuft of moss by the pods. The pinched stems stirred. I took a closer look. They look like legs!
LEGS?
My heart thumped once. I stopped breathing. This wasn’t moss I was hugging. These were hundreds, no, THOUSANDS, no, MILLIONS of spiders with long legs and tiny bodies.
I yelped, let go of the tree, and fell to the ground. Scuttling to my feet, I sprinted to the picnic area. While I raced, BILLIONS of spiders scurried over my feet, my legs, my hands, and my lower arms. The faster I ran, the more spiders covered my skin.
At the camp, I flung myself onto the blanket, shrieking, rocking back and forth to shake them off. Papa uncoiled like a snake from his blanket. He bore down on me and brought me to my feet. “What’s wrong with you?” He turned to Maman. “Is she hysterical or what?”
I squealed. Batted at his hands and the spiders. He shook me. “Get hold of yourself.”
Maman threw a mug-full of water at my face.
Suddenly, the spiders were gone and everyone at Djebel Ouach stared.
Maman came close and brushed wet hair from my face. “What happened, ma fille?”
“Didn’t you see the spiders?”
“What spiders?”
“The spiders that were ALL over me?”
“I did not see any spiders.”
“Oui, oui, they were HERE and HERE and HERE, they were ALL OVER me.” With each word, I hit a part of my body—hard.
“I am sorry, ma fille, there were no spiders.”
“Yes there were, and I’ll show you where I got them.”
I grabbed her hand and pulled hard. Zizou and Mireille hung close. Papa and the onlookers followed. Far behind, trying to keep up, Yves hung on to a grinning Riri.
At the foot of the tree, I pointed at the trunk. Triumphant. “Here they are.”
Papa and two other men picked curiously at the “moss,” agreeing that these were indeed spiders. “However,” they wondered, “what made her believe she was crawling with them?”
Papa slipped into the role of “Inspecteur Vincent,” as he called himself whenever he was in an inquiring mood. He ordered me to reenact my story from the time I reached the foot of the tree.
I clutched Maman’s arm. “NON. I don’t want to go up that tree again.”
“All right. Let’s say, you are climbing the tree, what happens?” Papa asked.
“My legs and my arms are around the tree, and I see that the moss on the trunk is not moss but TRILLIONS of spiders.”
Zizou chuckled. Mireille swatted at invisible spiders crawling up her arms. The boys were still trying to catch up with us. Ma took my hand. Papa’s mouth twitched at one corner. “Let’s not lay it on too thick now, shall we? What do you do then?”
“I fall down and then I get up real quick and I run real fast and then spiders run ALL OVER me.”
“Alors, do it,” Pa said.
I watched him, puzzled. He stood tall, feet apart, cigarette loosely dangling from his lips, one eye half-closed against the rising thread of blue smoke, hands on hips. “Get,” he barked.
I sprinted toward the campsite. Waist-high grasses lashed at my skin. I screeched, then stopped. The thin golden stalks bore crowns of maturing hairy seeds that tickled as I waded through them. Mortified, I walked back and confessed, “I thought the weeds were spiders.”
Papa walked away, shaking his head, scowling, one hand in his pants pocket, the other, holding the cigarette, flung into the air as if to say, “My poor girl, you are such an asshole. What am I to do with you?”
The onlookers followed, talking and laughing. I tagged along, the boys, finally caught up, by my side.
Back at the picnic ground, humiliated and exhausted, I dropped down on our blanket, my brothers on each side of me.
“Spider,” Riri warned, as he cast a dry leaf at my face and laughed.
I scooted backward with a whimper.
Papa picked up his boules for a game of pétanque and walked away. “When will you learn to get your head out of your ass and start living among us?” he snarled over his shoulder.
I sat on the blanket, shivering in the warm air, as the first beats of an accordion and the clacking of Pépé’s castanets announced dancing time.
That very night, after I finally managed to fall asleep, I woke up in the center of a greenhouse. The glass-paneled ceiling and walls muffled outdoor sounds. A heavy coat of grime and dust filtered the bright daylight.
I brushed aside the drapes of thick muslin surrounding me. Their ripples revealed more folds. I spun slowly, looking for an exit. But there was none.
TRAPPED!
I held my breath and charged through the hanging layers. Arms extended. Head low. Eyes slitted. The drapes tore in swatches of tacky dust and stuck to my head. My arms. My clothes. I plucked them off my face. They clung to my fingers. I moaned. What’s this stuff?
Like a caged bird, my heart banged against my ribs. I screeched, “Wake up, Nanna!” But this was not a dream. I thrashed and spun in a mindless whirl. The webs pinned my arms against my sides. Swathed me in a cocoon. Eyes sealed open. I moaned. Panted for air. A lump of dusty muslin plugged my mouth ….
“Hush, ma fille, hush. It’s only a nightmare.”
I gulped a lungful of air and opened my eyes. Saw Ma bending over me, holding my bloodied hands. “You scratched your ears.” She dabbed ether on the lobes of my newly pierced ears. “They look all right. We can leave the earrings in.” She bathed my face and hands with cold towels, gave me water mixed with sugar and Aspirin, and then stayed with me until I fell asleep.
The next morning, she asked, “Do your earlobes hurt, ma fille? Do you need to take your earrings off?”
I shook my head. The small gold earrings had been Mémé Honninger’s then Maman’s, given to them at their Communion Solennelle. Now they were mine for my own First Communion. The prettiest things I’d ever owned. “They sting a little, Ma, but I’ll keep them on.”
Nanna, age 12, in back garden lavender, 1954.
By First Communion day, my earlobes had healed, and while I admired the reflection of the earrings sparkling on each side of my face, I glared at the dress waiting for me on a hanger.
For years and years, I had marveled at the girl communicants in their bride-like fluffy white gowns and veils, dreaming of when it would be my turn to look like the doll on top of a wedding cake. I had it all planned. My gloved hands would smooth back the veil—floating in the spring breeze like a wisp of cloud and held into place by a crown of pristine flowers. The dainty white suede shoes would crunch over the graveled church square while bells called for the two rows of boys and girls to pass the church portals. Each of us would hold a tall candle adorned with a white bow, while the choir sang hymns and the smell of incense heralded our walk down the aisle.
I cast a resentful eye at the habit I was to wear. The dream of many years shredded faster than a wisp of cloud in a storm. The only feature this dress held in common with that of my dreams was the color. Adieu, fluff, adieu, veil—only a nun-like white tunic, complete with wide pleats from shoulders to hem, long, wide sleeves, and a rope tied at the waist. Yuck.
Most horrid of all was the skullcap that made my head look like a snow-capped Kilimanjaro.
There was a reason for this new austerity: at the ten o’clock Sunday mass, Le Père Attar had announced that, from then on, the Communion Solennelle would return to the true significance of the ceremony—“the renewal of the baptismal profession of faith, instead of an occasion to coddle girls’ vanity and stretch their parents’ wallets.” He believed the alb, cross, and candle, symbolizing the virginal aspects of Baptism, were de rigueur.
“But, Papa, not everybody is obliged to wear the alb.”
“Get out of here; I don’t have time for your crap.”
“Si, Papa. Le Père said it was up to each family to decide how much money they wanted to spend on their daughter’s communion. He said that, for this year only, people can choose if they want to dress the new way OR the old way and that the church is going to rent out the albs at a low price and he hopes that everyone will make the right choice.”
Papa frowned. “Does he think I cannot afford to buy a dress for ma fille?”
I looked at him with brows arched, arms half stretched in front of me, palms open heavenward, shoulders raised—hoping to convey with my body language, “What can I say?”
Papa’s eyes flashed green and mean. “I’ll talk to Attar.”
YES! Sparks would fly and Papa was going to win this one for me.
Everyone knew that Papa and le Père could not be in shouting distance of each other without getting into a semantic crusade. They both clearly enjoyed their clashes over widely conflicting interpretations of the Bible, but their antagonism was robust.
Waiting for the inevitable result of the collision between Papa and Père Attar, I prepared for the choices I would soon be facing.
Did I want a satin or lace dress? With a lace dress, obviously a lace veil would not do. Hm, I am not sure—I’ll ask Yvette.
Tonton Gilles’ wife was a dressmaker and had offered to make my Communion dress and veil.
Perhaps I could have Maman convince Papa to let me wear shoes with a small heel, instead of my usual flats. Of course, my being not yet twelve, the heels would have to be really tiny-little-bitty to get a nod from Papa. I crossed my fingers.
We’d also have to get a pair of these dainty, embroidered, flimsy gloves with ribbons at the wrist—my Sunday mass mesh cotton ones would definitely not do.
I rolled my eyes upward for inspiration. Did I want a flower crown to hold the veil in place, instead of pearl hatpins? If so, should the flowers be fresh or silk? Nah, silk flowers were more glamorous.
For several wrenching days, I waited in silence for Papa’s verdict.
“For once,” he said, “I agree with Attar. Families who have a problem making ends meet should not feel they have to keep up with the Durands. Those of us who don’t fit this profile should set the example. And I shall.”
“That means I’ll wear the alb?”
“Oui.”
Apparently, le Père Attar—tricky soul—had convinced Papa that, as a comfortable member of the parish—Liar!—it was his duty to spare the pride of the less affluent and set an example by having me wear the alb.
And that was that.
One for le Père Attar, ZERO for Pa, and the Alb for me.