CHAPTER 2

CHANGES 1922

When Willi attempts his first few wobbly steps, we girls squeal with pleasure, then race through the house looking for Mama and Papa, who must come to see. As we burst into their room, giggling and chattering all at the same time, we sense a cold stillness that has never been before and we become suddenly quiet. We are stopped at the doorway, then shushed and hustled away by our nanny. Doctors have been visiting for several days, and we have become used to seeing them scurrying in and out of the house. But there is something different this day as we see them leave in a strange shuffle of muttered regret and shaking heads. We are asking questions anxiously, all at the same time, in an unintelligible swarm like buzzing bees. I can see Erna and Stella starting to cry. I can’t comprehend what is wrong, so I return to the other room to play with Willi, who has tumbled to the floor from his last attempt at walking on his own. I struggle to pick him up, but there is no one else around to help and he begins to wail in frustration. Soon we are both crying and the nanny can’t settle us down. We want Mama but she doesn’t come.

Tears streaming, shoelaces untied, I wander through the house searching for Mama but find my sisters instead. “What has happened?” I ask them. “Why is everyone crying all at once? Where is Mama?”

“You can’t see Mama now. Papa is gone, don’t you know?” Stella answers through impatient tears. Stella always makes me feel foolish and tells me that I don’t know anything.

“Where is he?” I ask in bewilderment.

Stella is eleven now and considers me to be nothing but a baby. I know she thinks that her sadness is more important than mine, and maybe she is right, but the sharp needle of hurt inside my chest is real and painful and I can’t stop crying.

I am barely six years old when Papa dies and vanishes from our lives forever. His loss is a constant lump of sorrow that burrows deep within me. I cannot completely understand the void he has left nor overcome the feeling of pain, of abandonment. Unable to fully grasp what has happened, I am overwhelmed by the outpouring of grief around me, adults in fits of tears that have always been reserved for children, and Mama weak and desperately sad.

For seven days we sit Shiva, a time of remembrance for the departed. A thick candle in a glass, set on our bureau, flickers day and night. All the mirrors are covered with cloth. We, the mourners, sit on low stools, and each of us has a torn black ribbon pinned to our shirt. Relatives and neighbours, their faces contorted in pity, come to visit every day to console us but their words can’t fill the cavernous emptiness.

I huddle with the baby in a corner and repeat nursery rhymes to him or sing little lullabies, faltering as I try to remember all the words. He is too young to be aware of the loss, and although I am expected to understand, confusion overlaps the sadness and I can’t resolve it. No one can explain the situation to me as each person in the household is absorbed in her own private mourning. The usual buzz of children’s voices is absent and even our constant arguments and bickering come to a standstill.

I don’t want to believe that he is gone forever. I wait at the front door at the end of the day, or peer longingly from the window, expecting Papa to come home as usual, patting my head with his palm and asking me questions in his deep voice. I think that he might be playing a trick on us all and will suddenly appear again, a twinkle in his eye and shaking with rollicking laughter at a clever joke. I pretend that he is just late from work and that he will be home soon. For a while I stand at the window in the evening, staring out at the darkening street, despite my sisters’ angry protests at my stupidity. Finally the truth is clear to me and reluctantly I know for certain that he never will come back again and I can wait no longer.

Often I find myself curled in his big chair, closed away from the rest of the family, dreaming of Papa and of our moments together. Trying desperately to hold on to the memories, for they are all that I have left of him, I look for signs that he is still around. Maybe he is whispering to me in the wind or winking at me in the bright sunlight pouring through soft white seedlings that flutter by the window. Sometimes I think I can hear him whistling to me in the bird’s song in the branches or calling out to me in the raindrops thumping on the road. I keep these thoughts deep within and share them with no one so they can’t fly away. I fear mostly that I will forget his face and his scent and that he will drift farther and farther away from me.

Our lives have changed as Mama has had to take over the running of the business as well as the household. She seems always to be tired, and we feel disconnected and alone. Still, Papa has left us with his most precious gift, our Austrian homeland that we cherish and his words of encouragement that give us all the strength to face our lives without him. Whenever we doubt ourselves, we remember his eyes, animated and kind, and the stories told as we used to crowd around his big chair.

“Children,” Mama says one evening in her most serious tone, after we have finished dinner. “I have found something among your father’s papers. He wrote this when he knew how ill he was. I have kept it with me for days now, wanting to read it to you, but couldn’t. I want you to know how important you all were to him and that his thoughts even near the end were of you.”

We all become silent as stone and look at her with scarcely a blink. Papa has sent us something, even though he is gone. We wait for her to carefully unfold the precious page of paper that she touches with solemn reverence and tenderness. She takes a deep breath and begins to read,

To My Dear Children,

Today you are children, nestled and safe

Warm beneath parents’ wings.

But the time will come when we have gone,

Then, alone you will face many things,

When the nest is cold and the belching wind howls,

And danger lurks at the door,

Unguarded, unshielded from harm you will be,

Against the world, you four.

When one of this brood is mired in pain,

And suffering creases his brow,

Shoulder the burden, lighten his load,

Do all that your strength will allow.

Remember the poor, that is my wish,

Give charity without restraint.

There will always be those more humble than you,

Listen to the beggar’s complaint.

Thus says your father, thus taught your mother

Through example and through deed,

Before you we set a path that is straight

And beg you our words to heed.

My legacy this will remain,

Words that may not suffice,

But all that I have, I give to you,

Your father’s heartfelt advice.

Your father

Tears begin to form in our eyes, and we brush them away with the backs of our hands. We hug Mama, whose white linen handkerchief, edged in lace, is a damp wad clutched in her fist. Papa is with us still and will be forever. We each vow to learn the poem by heart and to cherish and keep it with us all of our lives.

Before long everyday happenings draw us up into a new reality. Our home is soon bustling again, full of daily routine and noisy confusion. We girls are off to school, Mama goes to handle the business affairs, and the baby is left behind with the nanny. Each of us becomes enmeshed in the multitude of things that perpetuate our ordinary lives, filled to the spilling edge with activities and obligations.

In the evening we are all together again at the dinner table. It is then that we are truly aware of our loss and of how much things have changed. At the head of the dining table, Papa’s seat stands empty but draws all our thoughts towards it. The baby cries woefully in the background as we eat in unusual silence. Mama stares at the vacant spot and doesn’t even notice the food before her. She can’t hear us when we speak to her and soon we stop trying. We have lost half of Mama along with Papa. We spend many nights in tearful retreat in our rooms with lonely dreams.

We girls tend to our lessons and try to help with Willi, who is the only one unaware of the changes and all that we have lost. He will never know Papa, not even for the few precious years of my memory. Mama seems to have aged so much. Her carefree laughter and humming melodies are no longer heard. She works long hours in the business and struggles to manage the burden she must bear alone. When she comes home, she slumps into Papa’s chair and hugs the big feathered cushion to her chest as if searching for his comfort to ease the load. We understand that the seat is now hers as she has become the head of the household, the one who must make all the decisions.

Summer is coming to an end, and I will be starting first grade in the fall. While the days are still warm and the sunshine bright, Erna, Stella, and I go to the park with our nanny every day. The grassy smells and happy sounds of children playing are a welcome change from our sad household. We skip on the lawns, tossing a ball to one another while the nanny sits on a nearby bench with Willi, asleep in his carriage. She takes out her knitting needles and ball of yarn to pass the time, looking up now and then to be sure we are not getting into any trouble.

There’s never enough time at the park for all the games we find to play. We tumble down the green hills, letting the world spin and blur, rolling faster and faster until we reach the bottom, laughing and so dizzy that we stumble and weave, drunk with abandon. We race to the swings, then stretch and bend our knees, flinging the seats high above the playground, arching and straightening our backs with the movement. We feel like birds, wind blowing wildly through our clothes and swishing our hair into our eyes. The nanny is already calling us to come down but we pretend not to hear her and continue swinging forward and back in wild swooping loops.

Finally she comes right to the foot of the swings, her expression of annoyance clearly creasing her face in an unattractive way as she shouts loudly, “Come, all of you, time to go now. Your mama will soon be home and expecting you to be ready for dinner. We still have to get you cleaned up. You’re a sight to see, covered in grass and dirt. The baby is awake and screaming, wanting to be fed. Come right this minute!”

We have been told to listen to our nanny and to show her proper respect. We know that Mama can no longer be with us all the time and that we need someone to care for us, but this one will leave just like all the others did before her and soon there will be another “fraulein” in the household folding our clothes and organizing our lives. They do their jobs in an efficient matter-of-fact way but offer no arms to hold us and have no kind word for our daily concerns. Some are nicer than others but we have learned not to count on anyone for too long as they will soon disappear. Mostly we have one another and no one else. We leave the playground reluctantly and head for home to wait anxiously for Mama’s return.