Thoughts about Hubris

We’ve heard and probably used expressions like “she has a swelled head,” and “he’s getting too big for his britches” to describe someone who is overconfident or arrogant, traits that often lead to a lack of self-awareness and self-defeating behavior. That’s a definition of hubris which, if it becomes all-consuming, can lead to an individual’s downfall.

In ancient Greek tragedies, the main characters who display hubris usually suffer gory deaths. Plots highlight seriously dysfunctional families, where a father might kill his wife, irritating his children who slay him, squabble among themselves, and do away with each other, while one of their cousins kills his mother, providing the opening act of a fresh tragedy. It became well known that it is best to avoid hubris.

Ancient Romans were not keen on hubris and sought to remind their heroic leaders of their need to be humble. Hollywood has portrayed that in swords and sandals spectacles where the conquering general returns to Rome in a parade featuring captured treasure, slaves, enemy commanders in chains, and brave legionnaires. The general drives a golden chariot, and a slave stands behind him, holding s golden crown over his head. He’s whispering something in the general’s ear. “Memento mori.” Remember that you are but a man.

Like most, I’ve had my moments of hubris. Fortunately, my wife and three daughters formed an anti-hubris squad, forcefully confronting my moments of arrogance and self-importance, deflating my hot air. Sometimes it worked. Maybe a slave would have been more effective.

Beginning our trek to Chavin de Huantar

This is a preamble to a story about a glorious moment of hubris shared by my wife, one of my daughters, and me. It happened in the early 1980s when we were all in good enough shape to enjoy mountain trekking. Our objective was Chavin de Huantar, an archaeological site in a 10,000 foot high valley in the Cordillera Blanca about 270 miles north of Lima. It held a flat-topped basalt pyramid originating from before 1,000BC that contained a huge stele and many skulls and crossbones carved from white stone. It was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and had been visited by few gringos, other than archaeologists. Getting there wasn’t like discovering a new world, but we thought it would be very cool.

The trek would take five days, and we had to navigate a high pass about 17,000 feet high. We had only three days to acclimate ourselves to the altitude and were prepared to suffer some on the trail. The third morning we saw the high pass silhouetted against the startling white mountains of the Cordillera Blanca, about 2500 feet above us. The sky was crystalline blue, clouded by our breath. The trail up was easy. The elevation was not. Our guide called out “arriba.”

Huascaran, the highest mountain above us on our trek

The problem with high altitude trekking is getting enough oxygen into your lungs and blood from the thin air to let your body function well enough to go on. We had no oxygen, so at about 16,000 feet our thought processes slowed, and we did our best to concentrate on which foot we needed to raise next to get to the pass. It appeared we were moving through chest-high water, and the pass was moving away from us. Yet, at noon, we reached an open field there.

The ancient pyramid

Our guide passed around a thermos of tea, and we felt ourselves recovering from our recent efforts. We were surrounded by glistening Andes mountains, deep blue skies with marshmallow clouds, standing in a meadow of tiny yellow orchids. We conquered the mountain. We were masters of the Andes. Hubris? You bet. Buckets of hubris. Slathered in hubris.

At that moment, a black and white border collie appeared from nowhere and ran full tilt to Nancy, jumped up and bit her in the right buttock.

It didn’t break the skin, but it punctuated that moment with a powerful reminder of our humanity.

I wonder how the Romans would have done if they just used a border collie.

Scorpions

A few years ago, in trying to explain how culture and environment influence a person’s attitude toward punctuality, I began a chapter in one of my novels like this:

“The people of the Amazon in Peru have a unique relationship with time. In the equatorial expanse of the jungle, there is little change in weather, seasons, sunrise, and sunset. Time seems to glide by slowly, accommodating itself to the languid ways of the region. Or, perhaps, the languid ways of the region reflect the almost imperceptible way that change occurs. The Amazon cares little about that. The river rises and falls twenty or more meters throughout the year, but the water level along its banks and on the hardwood stilts supporting homes by the river seems to move hardly at all from day to day. Dugout canoes glide almost effortlessly along, so low in the brown water that only surface tension keeps water from rushing in. The lush foliage challenges the observer to count its shades of green and hides the way into the jungle, only hinting at the dark, impenetrable wall of intertwined vegetation just a few meters from the river’s edge. Enormous trees, buttressed by wall-like roots, gradually rise above the jungle to offer support to the thousand species of birds in the region. The strangler fig takes its time as it slowly reaches upward to surround a tall tree. It dies in its grasp and crumbles away, leaving the delicate latticework of the fig to host the birds that don’t notice that the tree is gone.

“The people of the river live in slow time. If fish do not bite today, they probably will tomorrow. If the river transport boat is a few hours or days late, that becomes an opportunity to chat with the neighbors, maybe make new friends. If it rains too hard to gather building materials from the jungle, it is fine to wait a day. Perhaps a cousin, uncle or sister will be here to help them. It is, of course, important to have a job, to make a living, to buy rubber boots, cell phones, headlamps and machetes. However, the jungle offers much for the taking – food, shelter, charcoal to sell, exotic barks to cure many illnesses. It is, of course, important to have a job. But even without a job, one can survive. There is no need to rush.”

Here is a seemingly unrelated story on which I’ll comment later.

A scorpion came up to a bullfrog, sunning himself on a log by the river. The scorpion said, “I need to get to the other side. I’d be very grateful if you’d give me a ride across on your back.” The bullfrog replied, “No way! What if you decide to sting me as I swim across?”

“Why would I do that? Then I’d drown. Don’t worry. I won’t do that.”

Relieved, the bullfrog let the scorpion climb on his back and swam into the river. Halfway across, the scorpion stung the bullfrog powerfully in the neck.

With his last breath, the bullfrog asked, “Why did you do that? Now we’ll both die.”

“I know,” said the scorpion. “It’s just my nature.”

Another anecdote defines the apex of punctuality. A German business associate picked me up in his Mercedes at my hotel in Munich for a two-hour drive to a meeting in another town. Construction delayed him, so when we hit the autobahn he cruised at 150 kilometers or more per hour. We arrived at our destination five minutes early, and I complimented him for being on time.

“To be early is not to be on time,” he said.

I inherited the punctuality gene, probably from German ancestors. Even though I understood the nature/nurture influence on people’s approach to punctuality, I tried to resist feelings of disappointment, anger, or rejection when others were tardy. I developed strategies for herding three teenage daughters to appointments, visits to relatives, and flights on time. Mainly, it involved lying about departure times. I also tried economic determinism and docked allowances for the pain and suffering my wife and I experienced because of their lateness.

Over time, I recognized that, though they hadn’t inherited the punctuality gene, my daughters had other admirable qualities that I lacked. I’m tying to emulate one of them—patience.

Yet, there are many of us who are slaves to our punctuality gene.

I guess that’s our nature.

Conundrum

I am cataloguing unexpected moments that created indelible memories and influenced the way I see the world. Looking back, events that seemed anecdotal at the time grew in importance as they resurfaced, forcing me to reconsider them, perhaps learn from them. Here’s one I am thinking about now.

On a lush spring morning in Beckley, West Virginia in the early 1980’s, I was discussing a client’s purchase of coal mining rights and tipple fees with a local lawyer. It was a friendly negotiation, and we had lunch together at his club, a reserved table at a busy diner on the main street, with a view of the town square and courthouse. The courthouse steps filled with excited people halfway through the meal, and a waiter soon came over to announce that Clem was acquitted. Conversation in the diner paused, then rose to air brake volume.

The lawyer excused himself, chatted with a new arrival at the diner, and returned to tell me this story. I don’t remember the exact words, but it’s accurate and has the additional benefit if being mostly true.

The defendant in this murder case was a young man, born and raised in Beckley, who followed his family tradition and worked as a coal miner. He was a star football quarterback in high school, an accomplished hunter, and generous to a fault, always willing to share what was in his well-stocked game larder. He lived with his parents when he began working in the mine and helped with family finances. After a while, he found a run-down cottage on a knoll overlooking evergreen timber lands and a pond. It was close to town and bordered little used railroad tracks at the bottom of the hollow.

Clem bought the cottage, fixed it up, and decided the one thing it needed was a girl from town that he’d known since high school. Busy as he’d been working and helping his parents, he wasn’t aware that Lilly was involved in a series of romances in town, none of which resulted in a diamond ring. She said she loved the cottage and him, and they soon married.

A witness at the trial confirmed that Lilly had a flexible approach to marriage vows and a continuing attraction to one of the McMillan boys. He and Lilly decided they would both be better off without Clem, but with the cottage.

Lilly told Clem she was going to visit her mother for a couple of days, and the McMillan boy with two brothers and a friend decided that a good time to visit Clem would be real early the next morning.

Clem admitted Lilly’s departure was unusual, mainly because she couldn’t stand her mother, and had a nagging doubt about her fidelity because she always had a headache or something when he felt romantic. Without thinking too much about it, he camped out on the hill above the hollow that night to enjoy the full moon and soft breezes. He took along his deer rifle.

At about one o’clock, Clem noticed four figures carrying rifles silhouetted against the moonlit silvery rails at the bottom of the hollow heading toward his cottage. He rubbed some spit on the front sight of his Winchester so the reflected moonlight would help define any available target. The figures below rushed toward his cottage with rifles raised. They were as clear as fireflies at dusk.

The coroner reported that of the three McMillan boys, two were shot clean through the head and one through the chest with .30-30 rounds. The friend, Jake Miller, was shot through the left buttock, mainly because he was running away down the tracks. He testified at the trial about the night’s proceedings and noted that his left leg didn’t work so good anymore.

The prosecution said it was out-and-out murder, and the defense said it was preemptive self-defense. I had never heard of such a defense before, but that didn’t bother the jury. They acquitted Clem.

The man my lawyer friend spoke with was a juror. He explained that the McMillan boys were trouble since Jesus was a pup. They’d caused more misery, heartbreak, and ruin than befell Sodom and Gomorrah. Those boys deserved killing. Aside from being in the right, the jury believed Clem had provided a public service. If they could, they would have awarded him damages, but that just couldn’t figure out how to do that. They decided on a speedy acquittal instead.

I admit to being bemused by this story. Had rough West Virginia justice prevailed? I thought considered the facts of the case. Clem had gone to the top of the hill that night on a hunch and was safely out of harm’s way from any attack. The local jury was influenced by the McMillan boys’ past misdeeds, but they were dead and couldn’t defend themselves. The defense lawyer made up a non-existent legal excuse to bamboozle the jury. Was this justice or the act of vigilantes? Was this a precursor of what passes for justice in some jurisdictions today?

Answers are not coming easily.

Life Hack – Tolerance

In spring of 1965, I worked on a project in Ecuador. Discussions in Quito took longer than usual, and I unexpectedly had a free weekend. Earlier, a friend who worked in the District of Columbia for our government’s agency for international development (USAID), suggested I visit one for their projects north of Quito while I was in there.

I’d worked with USAID officials on a few public-private ventures in other locations. I respected their mission and dedication and was curious to see my tax dollars at work in South America. Our Quito embassy arranged the visit, and, on a brisk Saturday morning, a junior attaché from the embassy and I headed north in an open jeep-like car.

In less than an hour, we escaped the confines of Quito and found a lush and fertile landscape surrounded by snow-covered peaks. My guide (I don’t remember his name, so I’ll call him “Fred”} pointed to the bushy fences that glided by our badly paved highway.

“The people here cut branches from the guato tree, stick them in the ground, and have those growing fences in two years,” said Fred. “They control the livestock and mark boundaries. The soil is rich right up to the timberline.”

I looked across dark-green fields and thousand-year-old terraces to the mountains. The view alone was worth the ride.

Fred concentrated on navigating the rutty road, and I enjoyed the scenery until the over two-mile-high altitude caused a knot of pain between my eyes. Fred handed me a bottle of water and suggested I take deep breaths. Gulping down the chilled air helped.

A village of frame and adobe buildings next to an ice-blue lake appeared, and Fred drove to its center square, the church opposing the mayor’s office across a park with paths, flowers and benches where a few villagers sat. Fred said I could stretch my legs while he went into the mayor’s office. He found me on a sunny bench when he returned with a young woman who was a teacher at the USAID school. I was relieved that her English was much better than my Spanish.

Within ten minutes we arrived at a single-story school building of concrete and timbers that resembled the homes in the village and a smaller building that the teacher explained was a clinic and infirmary used by a visiting nurse twice a month. There were no classes on Saturday, but a few children kicked a soccer ball in a playground, and people were at work in the adjoining fields and at the lakeshore. We toured the buildings, and the teacher proudly showed four tidy classrooms with small desks, cabinets, shelves of books, and the children’s art on the walls. Bathrooms, a small kitchen, and a teacher’s meeting room completed the schoolhouse which was powered by a diesel generator standing beside the infirmary.

I was impressed with the quality of construction and the obvious benefit the school provided to the village. I considered my tax dollars well spent.

A small group of villagers gathered near the playground as we left the building, and we walked toward them. I thought they were curious about the gringos examining their school, perhaps wishing to express their gratitude for the new school. A woman stood out from the others. A short brimmed brown fedora covered her glossy black hair, and her wrinkled face was the color of weathered mahogany. Most of her teeth  had found other homes. She wore a checkered gray shawl over a red blouse and a dark blue skirt that swished across the dust at her feet. She angrily pointed a finger and moved toward me and asked something in Spanish. The teacher said, “She wants to know where you are from.”

I knew enough Spanish to answer, “Estados Unidos.”

“Ladrón,” she shouted, reached down to pick up a handful of dirt, and threw it at my face. She stood grimacing at me as I pulled back and tried to brush the dirt away. I was speechless which, in my case, is rare. Some men from the group pulled her away, muttering Spanish deprecations. The teacher handed me a tissue to wipe my face, and I tried to make light of the matter, saying something like, “Well, so much for Ecuadoran gratitude.” Perhaps I laughed a bit.

It was now midafternoon, and Fred offered us a cold beer. We drove to a terraced restaurant in the square.

Beer in hand, Fred said, “It’s not usually that dramatic, but I’m accustomed to what seems like ingratitude for the things USAID does. It took me a while to get it, but I understand that these people have a cultural history of exploitation, and it’s not part of their makeup to believe that any outsiders do nice things out of the goodness of their hearts. Even if they can’t figure out what our angle is, they know we’re gaining a benefit at their expense, so why should they thank us for it?”

“That is true,” said the teacher, “ever since the conquest, when the Spaniards enslaved us, slaughtered us by their cruelty and diseases, and took away our natural bounty, we have been dehumanized and exploited. You Americans haven’t been angels, either. You have invested in mining and timber here, exported raw materials, polluted our waterways, and clear cut our forests. The British did the same. Our people see red-faced people as looters or worse.”

Our conversation turned to other things. We said goodbye to the teacher, and Fred drove us back to my hotel in Quito.

Having a handful of dirt thrown at one’s face stimulates internal conversation, and I had a long talk with myself that evening. No one had so radically challenged one of my core values before. That crone’s action shocked me because, based on my background and culture, one was supposed to be thankful for other’s good deeds, not resentful. I was ashamed of my arrogance in supposing that woman’s thought patterns were the same as mine. And humbled that I didn’t try to understand her motives rather than just brush her off.

My work evolved to help with negotiations between American and foreign businesses. I never forgot that woman and tried my best to put myself into my negotiating partner’s shoes. It took longer to understand the individuals involved, but tolerance had excellent results.

And it turns out that approach works with friends and relatives too.

Spices

My Onkle Heiner was a ski trooper in the German army and was shot through his left biceps in 1917. For two years, he continually squeezed a rubber ball in his left hand until bone, flesh and nerves healed completely. The scar on his arm was white on both sides and the size of a silver dollar. He was my favorite uncle.

He emigrated to the United States in the mid nineteen twenties and married my mother’s sister, Elsa. They had a daughter who died young and a son, Willy, whom I idolized growing up. Heiner worked as a foreman in the Hummel Brothers sausage factory in New Haven, Connecticut and was strong and solid as an oak. He loved kids and let us pick from the fruit trees in his backyard, climb fences, and slide down his cellar door. There was always a twinkle in his eye that meant forthcoming delights like squeezing four kids on to the floor of the Ford’s rumble seat, close the lid and take us for a ride in a rainstorm. The rain pelting the tin above us, the rumble of the engine in the humid interior, the closeness of our bodies in the darkness was indescribably joyful. Double scoops of maple walnut ice cream afterwards was frosting on the cake of contentment.

My favorite times with him were when I helped him clean machines and prepare for the next week at the factory on Saturday mornings. I was eight or nine the first time and fascinated by the gleaming machines and refrigerators holding huge slabs of meat. He told me I shouldn’t know what went into a hot dog and then showed me anyway. It was fascinating but shocking, and I will not share it with you. Let me just say that if you think your hot dog tastes like eyeball, you are probably right.

The Hummel brothers came to the United States after a rigorous apprentice program in Germany with an excellent understanding of the role spices play in sausage making. This they passed on to Onkle Heiner who proudly displayed the spice closet in a sunny corner of the factory floor. Even though it was tightly built, I could smell the contents eight feet away. It was breathtaking. There  were familiar and mysterious aromas fighting for attention by the receptors in my nose. It was overwhelming. I sneezed three times before the door opened and I saw the boxes, bags, and bottles arrayed on eight-foot-high shelves.

My uncle let me sniff a dozen varieties, naming them and their countries of origin. I remember a few. Saffron and smoked paprika from Spain. Ground anise seed and oregano from Italy. Cinnamon powder from Ceylon. Ground ginger from India. Annatto powder from the Caribbean. And cracked fennel seed, allspice, and garlic from Germany. A budding stamp collector, I knew where those countries were, so I soon associated the shape, color, taste, and home country with each spice’s smell. I couldn’t wait for my uncle to unlock the spice closet Saturday mornings. At first overwhelmed by competing aromas, I began to distinguish individual scents and, in my mind, associate them with pictures of stamps and imagine being in those marvelous places. I traveled the world in that spice closet.

Heiner was born in 1899. In his nineties, he told me he wanted to live to 101 so he could tell Saint Peter he lived for three centuries. Saint Peter had other ideas; Heiner passed on when he was 98.

Whether by plan or coincidence, over the years my work took me to many of the places I imagined in the spice closet. I now realize how fortunate I was to have an uncle who understood the power of aromas to stimulate the other senses and enhanced my library of known scents. Now retired, I have more time and inclination to turn another olfactory page and enjoy memories of times and scents past. With age, one becomes more easily amused, and I can sniff the time away. My nose doesn’t require recharging, booting, a bigger screen, or an outlet, and all the inputs are free. Most of the downloads come from the twentieth Century. And that’s a good thing.

Trouble Shooter

Since I last wrote in this blog, a major life change occurred. My wife and I moved to a two-bedroom cottage in a life care community. No more stars to climb, grass to cut, or gardens to maintain. Meals and many maintenance items like haircuts are available on site, and there are many new friends with similar life experiences to make. When friends ask how we like it, we say it’s 80% perfect and 20% needs work.
The editor of the community newsletter asked if I’d provide an article, so I wrote a short memoir that I’ll also share here. Like much of my writing, it’s based on something I experienced, part true, part made up. You can figure out what’s made up.

On a sultry Saturday morning in April 1965, I left my hotel room in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and took the elevator to the dining room on the second floor for breakfast. I was an attorney three years out of law school, working as international counsel for a pharmaceutical company and was up earlier than usual, unable to go back to sleep in anticipation of the day ahead. Yesterday evening we concluded a complicated distribution agreement for my company’s drugs with a new partner, and I scheduled a midday flight to Montego Bay, Jamaica to meet my wife, Nancy. It was her first trip out of the country. I expected a wonderful weekend together in an exotic location.
The second-floor balcony overlooked the lobby below where I noticed two young men standing near the front desk. One had a moustache that looked as though he’d forgotten to wipe his mouth after drinking milk, and the other’s cheeks blazed with acne. They wore oversized khaki shirts and clutched snub-nosed Uzi machine pistols. The safeties were off and each had his finger on the trigger.
Otherwise, activity in the lobby seemed normal. People were talking with the desk clerk who was sweating but nonchalant, the elevators moved smoothly, and a row of local taxis lined the roadway leading to the hotel. Among the people sitting on overstuffed chairs was Felix, a driver whose taxi was an immaculate 1948 Cadillac Fleetwood sedan that gleamed as brightly as the single gold tooth shining among the white ones in his mouth. I hired him to be my chauffeur and guide during my four-day visit to Santo Domingo.
Felix noticed me, waved, and I motioned him to come up and join me for breakfast.
“Army boys want Bosch back,” said Felix, wiping muffin crumbs from his white shirt. Then he expanded my knowledge of both Spanish and English curses in describing the corrupt and venal administration that succeeded Juan Bosch who was elected in the country’s first free election in decades and ousted a year later.
“Jack Kennedy, you know, they say he helped get rid of Bosch. Thought he was soft on communism,” said Felix, drawing his finger across his throat.
Then he put on his conspirator’s face. “Didn’t want another goddam Cuba here, you know.”
Fascinated as I was by his lecture on current events, I was more interested in avoiding teenagers with Uzis and making it to the airport on time and in a single piece. I reminded him he was supposed to take me to the airport.
“Better go now,” he said. “There’s a little shooting downtown, and there’s gonna be roadblocks, maybe ten. Maybe more. Get yourself some fives.”
He meant I should supply myself with American five-dollar bills, which the desk clerk provided as I checked out and Felix took my bag to the trunk of the Cadillac.
During the past four days, the Cadillac became my second home. It ran quiet and smooth, even across bumpy Dominican roads. The air conditioning worked, and it offered a smorgasbord of familiar and agreeable aromas: Simonize, acrid chrome polish, the piney scent from the cardboard tree hanging from the mirror, the musty smell of well-maintained upholstery in a tropical climate. I eagerly opened the passenger door to sit next to Felix, as in previous trips.
He shook his finger. “No. Sit in back, like a Jefe. Give me your passport and the fives.”
Putting my trust in Felix, I climbed into the back seat, put on my best Jefe demeanor, and watched steam rising from the palm trees along the highway, last night’s dew warmed by the tropic sun.
As we reached the highway, we heard the rat-tat-tat of machineguns nearby. Felix headed the car in another direction as I stiffened in the back seat, wondering if, after making it through the Korean War, I’d meet my end on a highway in the tropics at the hands of teenagers with Uzis. Not a pleasant prospect.
Felix wandered through rutted roads for a few miles and pulled back onto the main highway toward the airport. Ahead, a garbage truck blocked the highway. It was surrounded by teenagers armed with rifles and two older men wearing khaki hats with brass insignia.
“Roadblock,” said Felix. “Look serious. Look important.”
I did my best, a thirty-year-old lawyer facing impending doom in the back of an antique Cadillac. I felt the very opposite of important.
Felix pulled up to a man with insignia, flashed his gold tooth, exchanged pleasantries in unintelligible Spanish, and handed over my passport with one of the “fives” jutting modestly from the top. Insignia studied my picture, saluted me and gave the passport back, minus the five.
After two more roadblocks, I lost count. Now my concern was that we’d run out of fives before reaching the airport. I briefly returned to thinking about my mortality when a road blocker fired his rifle in the air a few times to encourage Felix to stop.
The last roadblock was at the entrance to the airport, manned by a young man in an officer’s uniform. He smiled and waved us through, surprising me by returning the passport with the five intact.
Felix retrieved my bag and offered a strong embrace, which I returned enthusiastically, and told him to keep the remaining fives along with a few larger bills I offered in exchange for the exciting ride to the airport. As he drove away, his left arm hugging the top of the driver’s door, he offered me a huge smile, gold tooth blazing in the sun. I never saw him again.
The flight to Jamaica was uneventful, and my wife and I enjoyed some relaxing days in a tropical resort. Four days after l left the Dominican Republic, President Johnson sent in the Marines to protect American interests, the first U.S. military intervention in Latin America in three decades.
When I returned to the office later that week, my peers welcomed me as a great “trouble shooter.” I was honored to think they were praising my abilities as a legal problem solver.
“Well, I guess that too,’ said one of my friends, “but we thought that wherever you go, there’s trouble and shooting.”

October

October has been a peculiar month in northwestern New Jersey. The temperature never dropped below 40, and abundant rain from Hurricane Ida and two nor’easters worked to create the best fall colors we’ve seen in years. I grew up in New England where I took for granted fall colors in brilliant hues with reds that took your breath away. In New Jersey, not so much. Yellows and browns mainly, with a blush of rouge.

This morning I could hear squirrels crunching through a carpet of leaves and, although the woods were just past their prime, there were enough leaves struggling to hold their grips to fill the woods with a last hurrah of color.

Although the long-range view is wonderful, you need to get close to absorb the kaleidoscopic pastels and arrogant primary colors, something to hold on to when the wind chills your cheeks and snow shows deer and fox tracks.

Here’s this morning’s remembrance of woods and garden bedding down.

Unfortunately, bedding down is not something that just happens. Human intervention is involved. Aside from raking, mulching, and light pruning, we should do other things to get ready for winter. This made me think of an advice column written by Bitsy Crangle, a character I invented for Master Gardener, a novel published a few years ago. I conceived of Bitsy as a busy body know-it-all master gardener who irritated my main character by continually pointing out how little he knew about gardening

But, in the unexplored and confused mind of this author, I got to like her deadly, and she turned into one of the book’s heroines. It’s one of those situations where your character simply takes over. Each chapter of the book begins with the gardening column Bitsy writes for the local paper in Middletown, New Anglia (which is one of those little-known states in New England). This is one she wrote for October:

Mastering your Garden

By Elizabeth Pendleton Crangle

            Picky, picky, picky! Many of you argued that Zucchini is a fruit and it should have been my “Z” for last month. I think that is still open to argument, but one reader explained that the Zinfandel grape is a fruit, so I sit (I don’t stand while writing) corrected. I used to teach school, and it’s nice to know you are paying attention.

            We can expect the first touch of frost this month, and you might want to extend the color and life of your annuals by covering them with a sheet or tarp on evenings when frost is expected. This is also the time to gather completely dried seedpods, collect the seeds, put them in a sealed container and refrigerate. Why pay the big seed companies their ever-increasing prices when your seeds are free? I especially encourage you to harvest Asclepias (milkweed family) seeds to plant next year. The monarch butterflies love and need those plants.

            This is also the month to give new plantings and container plants plenty of water. With cooler weather, we don’t notice how dry it gets, but the plants do. The good news is that you probably will not have to water again until spring. Along those lines, you may still plant trees and shrubs now. Once watered in and dormancy sets in, they will begin to establish themselves over the winter and get a good start next spring.

            Apples! They are so good and so many varieties of them are available at farm stands and markets now. Last year I bought a little apple-peeling machine that saved me hours of work. Look for the ones that core and peel apples by turning a crank. If you know how to use the www web, you can learn how to make applejack from the peelings. Strictly for medicinal purposes, of course.

            Chances are fall rains will saturate the soil around your home, making weed control a bit easier. Perennial weeds will only become more of a nuisance next year so remove them (such as thistle, dandelion, dock, Japanese knotweed and plantain) with an appropriate tool and try to get all the roots. Mulch your garden heavily with an organic mulch (I’ve had success with well-rotted horse manure) to thwart winter weeds and protect perennials from freezing and thawing.

            I have a friend who can’t wait for the first frost to harvest rose hips for tea and jelly. He breaks off the stems and spreads them out on newspapers (he says the Courier-Times works best) to dry. When they begin to shrivel, he removes the seeds and lets them dry completely. He stores them in sealed plastic containers and crushes a teaspoon full to make one cup of tea. With honey, it’s summer all over again.

            In my garden, I have many berry plants to help feed birds over the winter, and I also put out suet and seeds, especially in early spring when food for them is scarce. I’ve discovered some of them love peanut butter, which I now buy in bulk from a wholesale warehouse. What we tend to forget is that birds need water over the winter too. There are heaters for birdbaths that keep them from freezing. Also, place a pile or two of brush around the yard so the little birds can find shelter from predators.

            As you can see, there is plenty to do in the garden in October. Resist the idea of putting it off until November. As you will see next month, a garden and a gardener never really rest!

                                                                                                Blissful gardening – Bitsy

If you’d like to read more about Bitsy, go to

Master Gardener: A novel–about threats from BIG AG, Magic Seeds from the Amazon, Saving the Monarch butterfly, and people in love – Kindle edition by Margenau, Rolf. Literature & Fiction Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

Firewood

End of the Season

How many teams have we watched and how many stories have we read about the lineup that shows promise at the beginning of the season,  looks like a champion a month before playoffs, and then, oh no! stumbles in the end and goes to ignominious defeat? I’ve played on teams like that, and can report there’s no glory in it!

You know I love to garden, for many reasons, one of which is that when a garden fades at the end of its season, it maintains a different sort of beauty .

We stumbled into fall a few days ago here in northwestern New Jersey. You must look closely to notice. Goldenrod shows bright yellow up to head high in greeny fields (BTW, it’s ragweed, not goldenrod, that makes you sneeze.) Spearheaded ash leaves began falling weeks ago, helped along by Ida. Red and sugar maples are blushing in the treetops, and, if you believe old farmers’ tales, we’re in for a rough winter because our squirrels have very bushy tails. What’s not to love about this time of year!

Here are pictures of the garden now. I hope you enjoy, as I do, the subtle beauty, the remembrance of past beauty and promise of wonders to come. There are goldenrod, sunflowers, asters, hydrangeas, phlox, colchicum, coneflowers, and autumn sedum.

.

Autumn Sedum
Golden Rod
We don’t need a caption here!
Colchicum
Hydrangea
Phlox

Summer Garden

I look forward to August 1st each year because that is the unofficial date one can stop weeding with a clear conscience. It is a time when one can give shoulders and knees a deserved rest since the garden has filled in. Cone flowers rub elbows with hydrangeas, black eyed Susans mingle with phlox, and there’s interdigitation going on among morning glories climbing for low-lying pear limbs. Stilt and crab grasses hide under lush foliage, and we lose sight of them looking at the rainbow hues above. The garden rabbit feels claustrophobic under the thick green umbrellas.

This is the time I look around and wonder if I haven’t subconsciously planted flowers that remind me of the girls I lusted after from afar in high school. There are the twin Veronicas in containers by the steps, Mandy climbing up the lamppost, sultry Lantana giving suck to bees. And in the corner, Becky and Susan showing off in black and bright yellow like road signs for pollinators. You doubt me? Here they are.

I still lust for Lantana. So do bees and hummingbirds, while deer pass her by. She originated in Australia so I was concerned she might grow upside down here, but she’s adapted. Maybe it’s my age, but I avoid exotics and lean toward less demanding, more pliant and rewarding flowers like Lantana and Marigolds. With little effort they thrive and flower all summer and don’t complain if I’m a day late in watering them.

Coneflowers and young Hydrangea
Summersweet

In a world where instant gratification is the norm, slightly delayed gratification is a desirable luxury. Last spring, I benefited from the help of a Covid-19 unemployed grandson who felt safe among the dried stalks and matted debris in the main garden that he removed and added to a hedge row next to our woodlot. He’s less than half my age, but he works more than twice as fast as I do, so he spared me a sore back while I made executive decisions about dead stalks removal. In early April the garden was pristine under a fresh layer of mulch with just a few bottle green shoots looking around. 

Today the Joe Pye weed is eight feet tall, providing a lavender-topped backdrop to phlox and black-eyed Susans. Shredded wood mulch has disappeared under a crowd of volunteer hostas I can’t bring myself to remove. Hydrangeas are puffing themselves up next to our bleached wood bench so that it feels like a soft green cocoon is blocking out earthly worries. So there it is. A little worry-free paradise where a few months ago green shoots pushed aside wood chips. Waiting for it, weeding it, anticipating it, savoring it. Beats bruising your thumbs for an hour at Grand Theft Auto.

Eight feet of Joe Pye Weed

Rereading this and focusing on my girls in the garden and knowing that we call our fall crocuses naked ladies, should I be concerned that we have a slightly X-rated garden? Nah, I don’t think so.

First Chapter of War Story

I rarely promote one of my novels on this log, but I’m responding to requests and think this is the easiest way to give readers a sample of what’s coming. Probably this summer. I set the novel in World War II and it follows the growth, adventures and romances of a young boy, a woman pilot and a Yale graduate through those dangerous times. These people grew up in New Haven. The fourth character is a young German soldier who becomes a POW after the Afrika Korps’ defeat and spends the rest of the conflict as a POW in America. The nine-year-old boy narrates the first chapter, describing what happens when the circus comes to town in August 1941 and the war begins later that year.

I am very interested in your reactions. Please contact me either through this blog at my author’s website: http://www.rolfmargenau.com.

Achim

August 1941

One August morning in 1941, my cousin Hansi lost his left hand to a circus tiger. I didn’t see it happen, but I ran over to where the fuss was and saw Hansi being lifted on to the front seat of a police car. They wrapped his left arm in a towel and he looked confused, but he wasn’t crying. I said nothing, but I did envy that he was getting a ride in a police car.

 Over in the cage where the tiger was, a man was poking her with a stick, trying to get Hansi’s hand away. She played with it like a cat with a mouse, tossing the little pink thing around and catching it in her mouth. When it looked like he was going to snatch the hand away, she grabbed it and swallowed it.

Two workers saw Hansi put down his bucket by the cage and start talking to the tiger and then reach in to pet her. Hansi was seven years old and had a cat at home. He was a little slow and tender-hearted. A worker pulled him away from the cage, but his hand stayed with the tiger. Afterwards, they decided not to shoot her because she only did what was natural. A lot of us didn’t agree with that, especially Onkle Fritz, but the circus train left the next morning, heading for Bridgeport.

My cousin Willy, five years older than me, told us about how the circus train would come early this morning, to set up in the field between the railroad tracks and Dixwell Avenue. They always needed kids to help, the little ones hauling hay and water and the older ones working to help set up tents and such. For that, we’d get free tickets to the circus for our family.

Mutti said it was okay for me to go, and I hardly slept that night, I was so excited. I kept looking at the hands of the Big Ben alarm clock by the night light, waiting for four o’clock. 

I pushed the lever to “off” and got up at five before four, dressing in my shorts and favorite plaid shirt in the dark. Mutti left butterbrot for me that I ate as I headed down to Auger Street, then over to Dixwell Avenue.

I remember the cool air on my legs and how quiet and dark all the houses along the road were. I couldn’t see some of them, it was that dark without a moon, but I knew where all my friends lived and made out the shape of their homes in my head.

By the time I got to the railroad underpass, I saw a pink glow over by East Rock, and when I got to the grassy area next to the tracks, I could make out Willy standing there with some other big boys, smoking cigarettes. They must have found someone selling loosies, because I didn’t think any of the stores around would sell them whole packs. Willy called me over and introduced me to the big boys as his “cuz,” which made me happy. Vinny, who lived over on Auger Street, stuck out his hand and said ‘Put her there,” like I was one of them. I think they were all in the tenth grade, like Willy. I waited for the train standing with them feeling gown up..

Hansi showed up just as the sun cracked over the horizon. He had this kind of goofy walk that was funny to begin with, and with his eyes squinty from looking into the sun, he made us laugh. Some boys teased him, but he was good-natured about it. Nobody ever got really mad at Hansi.

Quiet as it was, our ears perked up when the far-off sound of a train whistle came our way. We saw a pinpoint of light down the tracks rushing toward us that was the headlight of the train. He didn’t care how early it was; the engineer blew the whistle loud and harsh. It changed pitch as it approached. The round black front of the train blended into the dark trees by the track, but the black smoke in front climbed up to darken the sun, and the white steam from the whistle disappeared like morning fog.

We stepped back from the tracks as the train clattered by—one long car after another blowing dust and smoke our way. Screeching like the brakes on my bike, only louder, it stopped about in the middle, and we could see the flat cars with cages and carriages and things we didn’t recognize stretching out toward the high school. It was the most wonderful thing I had ever seen.

Then, big men poured out of the carriages and unloaded crates and canvas and poles and began spreading everything out on the wet grass. I jumped back to get out of the way and Willy grabbed my arm and pulled me over to see a man who wore a dirty brown fedora. The man asked our names, licked his pencil, and wrote them down on the paper on his clipboard. He sent Willy over to carry ropes and help the roustabouts, and I went over to the elephants–the ELEPHANTS! I couldn’t believe it. I was so lucky. Even though I carried water and picked up their poop with a shovel, I was with the elephants. Until the tiger got Hansi’s hand.

Things settled down, and we helped until a little after noon, when the tents and flags were in place, the carriages lined up, and the train engine purring away, sending power to the carriages. The performers came out. Little people and big women in fancy robes. Men and women testing wires and ropes and looking after the animals in their cages. Things smelled different too. It was probably the animals, especially the elephants.

We gathered around the man in the fedora, and he handed us special passes for the performances later that day. The big boys, including Willy, got shiny fifty-cent pieces because, I guess, they worked harder. I was tired and hungry and would have liked one too. Willy said he’d share with me later. When I got home, I took a nap for the first time since I was little.

The show was at seven, so we would have time to listen to the news at six and get there on time. I had four circus passes, one each for Mutti, my little sister, and me. Vati was away, so I asked Freddy, my peanut buddy on Giles Street, if he wanted to come. I always liked going to his house because his mother had a different way of talking. “A” s in her words sounded like “on,” and her “r” s were funny too. Freddy said it was because she came from England and never learned how to speak normally.

When I got there, Freddy’s big sister came out on the porch.

“Freddy can’t play with you anymore,” she said, like it was written in stone.

“How come?”

“Mum says because you’re a dirty jerry, that’s how come.”

I didn’t want to look stupid, so I just said, “Oh,” and went back down the porch. But I didn’t like the way she cocked her head and stuck her tongue out when she called me a dirty jerry. It made me mad like when somebody says heads up AFTER they throw the ball. So, I just kicked a brick by their sidewalk loose and decided I’d ask Freddy about it Monday morning at the school playground. That’s where we met during vacation to plan our days and pick sides.

My next best friend was Stosh, and he lived two houses over from Freddy. He was excited about going to the circus and promised to give me his blue aggie next week.  So that was the four of us who went back to Dixwell Avenue that evening.

I didn’t get back from Stosh’s in time to listen to my first show that afternoon, but I heard the Lone Ranger, Jack Armstrong, all-American boy, and Sergeant Preston and King in Challenge of the Yukon. When he said, “On, on you huskies” it always gave me goose bumps.

The Philco was in a corner of the living room. I liked to look straight at the big round dial that glowed yellow when we turned it on. The reddish-brown wooden case rose from the floor and made an arched top. It always smelled of lemon oil that Alma used as polish on the days she cleaned house. I liked that smell. It reminded me of cold lemonade we sometimes got during summer vacation.

My sister and I would lie on the floor in front of the speaker and would try to figure out how the glowing green light in front blinked on and off when people talked.

When he was home, Vati was in charge of the four buttons and the tuning knob. But he wasn’t home that night, so Mutti asked me to find the six o’clock news. When it was over, there would still be plenty of time to get to Dixwell Avenue by seven.

The war news was always first, right after the loud music and clackety noises. Then the announcer came on and welcomed America. Then he told us about what was happening in the Battle of Britain. He was very serious and said that the Luftwaffe had dropped bombs on the financial district of London and on Oxford Street in the West End. There were a lot of casualties. But today, the RAF bombed Berlin for the first time during the war. They didn’t kill anybody, but it caused “loss of face” for Hermann Gӧring who worked with Hitler, because he boasted that the RAF would never bomb Berlin. I saw a picture of Gӧring in Life. He wore a white suit with big black boots and was fat with double chins.

Mutti’s mouth was tight and thin as she heard the news, and she put her hands on my head and my sister’s. She wiped her eyes, too.

When the announcer got to the best part, sports, Stosh banged on the door, so he got to hear the latest scores too.

When the news was over, Mutti stood by the kitchen sink for a while and looked out the window as though she was expecting a visitor. Maybe she was thinking about her brother, who was a soldier in Germany. She hadn’t heard from him since we moved to our new house last year. She told Vati that she was afraid the post office wasn’t forwarding mail from Germany, but Vati didn’t think so. We didn’t talk about my uncle except at home.

 Then she straightened up and herded us together, and we walked down the street to Auger, on the way to Dixwell. The sun was in our eyes, but we didn’t care.

Mutti said she was sad about Hansi, but she didn’t hold it against the circus, and we all had a really good time there. I wasn’t sure which tiger ate Hansi’s hand. They all looked mean, snarling at the man with the whip. I was glad to see the elephants sitting down and pretending to step on a lady. I felt like I had helped their act with giving them water.

The side show was almost as good as the show in the tent, except that I had my doubts about the Siamese twins. They didn’t look that much alike, and I think I saw one of them walking alone that morning. The strong man had a big wobbly belly, but he sure could bend steel bars. Mutti heard him talk German to a bearded lady, so she spoke to him when he was on a break. She was always glad to talk with someone with a German background, she said.

It was past my sister’s bedtime when we started our walk home, but she was so excited by the circus she made the walk with no trouble. Stosh made me angry by goofing around and teasing my sister, so I punched him in the arm. Most of the way Mutti didn’t say much, so I asked her about my being a dirty jerry.

“Liebling,” she said, “Jerry is what some people in England call Germans. You just heard about how the German Luftwaffe is bombing England, and how people in England are getting hurt, so I can see why they would call Germans dirty. Don’t worry about it.”

“But I’m not German, am I?”

“No,” she said, “you were born in New Haven and you’re American.” She paused. “But you have a German background.”

The circus was the best thing of the whole summer. Second best was that I turned nine the same week I started fifth grade which was when Inky came over to my class from hers.  That was because Miss Hendricks. who was her fourth-grade teacher, got promoted to teach fifth grade and thought Inky should have a new teacher for fifth grade, who was my Miss Smith, the one with dimples. Inky’s father was friends with Vati and her big sister would sometimes baby sit my sister and me, so I was already friends with Inky.

 Her nickname was “Inky,” but her proper name was “Inge.” Some kids couldn’t say it so good, so they called her “Inky,” and that was okay with her. She had black hair and blue eyes, so “Inky” sort of fit.

Like Inky I had a nickname. I even had two. My name is “Joachim” after my grandfather who died after the First World War, and my German nickname is “Achim.” But when kids at school tried say “Achim” it comes out “ACKhim,” which I didn’t like because it sounds ugly. So, after first grade, I said my name was “Jo,” which is easy. I don’t tell that in German you would say it like in “Yo-yo.” So, in school I was “Joe” and at home “Achim.” Inky speaks German like me, but she called me “Joe” most of the time, except when we are with family. That’s kind of dopey but I guess that comes with having a German background in New Haven..

Inky was mainly friends with girls but also with me and Stosh and Freddy and we got along okay She was a good sport for a girl.

By the second week in December, we hoped the frigid weather would have froze the water, so Stosh and Inky and me took the Dixwell Avenue bus out to Mixes Pond after church. Stosh and I just liked to skate, but Inky was a figure skater and practiced twice a week at the Arena.

The man at Mixes Pond pointed to the ducks swimming in open water at the end of the pond and said sorry kids, the ice ain’t thick enough. So Inky just sat on a bench and Stosh and I threw snowballs at the ducks for a while, killing time until we could take the bus back. It was already getting dark when we got to the green, where we had to change busses to go back up Whitney to Blake Road. We sat together on a bench to wait. Inky was looking over toward the Christmas lights covering the front of Malleys.

“Look at all the policemen on Church and Chapel,” she said. “I’ve never seen so many except maybe in a parade. And there’s nobody in Malleys. What do you think?”

“It’s Sunday,” said Stosh in that voice he used when he tried to put someone down. “Nobody shops on Sunday.”

Inky looked hurt and turned away, so I said, “Yeah, but look at all those policemen. And the police cars parked in front of the church.”

Stosh admitted that was funny–not ha ha.

Some old people came to wait for the bus, so we gave up the bench and stood behind them. They were talking in low voices and one of them was crying. People were talking about something they couldn’t believe. They were talking about “pearl harbor” and a “sneak attack” and “Arizona.” One of the old men kept muttering about “lousy Japs.” The only thing we recognized was the Japs. They had been talking about them on the evening news for the past week.

On the way up Whitney the people on the bus were all talking low, all about something the Japs did. The men seemed angry, and some women were crying. Inky kept shushing us. She was trying to figure out what was going on. Finally, she asked the lady across the aisle why everyone was so excited. That’s when we learned that the Japanese had attacked our naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, a little after noon and sunk most of our navy ships there. Nobody knew how many of our soldiers and sailors died, but a man on the bus said he was in the navy and predicted the loss would break our hearts. Everyone was quiet after that.

Inky had a watch, so she knew it was a few minutes after five when we got off the bus at Blake Road. It took about twenty minutes, fifteen if we ran up the hill, to get to our streets. The Shadow was on the radio at five thirty, so I thought I could get home in time to hear about the evil that lurks in the hearts of men.

But when I got home, Mutti and Vati were listening to the radio already, and it was all news about Pearl Harbor, and then about a place called Manila that the Japs were bombing even as the announcer talked to us. A man in London told us how the people there were “reacting” to the news, and then Vati tuned in Lowell Thomas. We listened to him for a long time. Mutti was crying and holding my sister, and hers big eyes were full of tears too. Vati face was red and he wrinkled his forehead so it looked like a washboard I never saw  him so angry and upset before, even when I scratched his car or came home late.

I thought of  all the people hurt and killed in Honolulu, especially the sailors trapped in the ships lying in Pearl harbor, and my stomach got tight and the back of my throat hurt.  I didn’t know much about the Japs but when I thought of what they did it was like when a sixth grader hits you and there’s nothing you can do about it.

When Lowell Thomas stopped talking for a while, Vati went to the kitchen and came back with a glass of wine for Mutti and the schnapps bottle and a little glass that he filled for himself. He told me to get some water for my sister and me. When I came back, he was shaking his head and staring at the yellow light on the Philco. Mutti’s cheeks were wet but she stopped crying and was sipping the wine.

Vati started talking to the radio.

“It’s that goddam Roosevelt,” he said. “He wants a war so he can help the Englander fight Germany. He and Cordell Hull managed these peace negotiations so the Japanese felt they had no choice but to attack us. Now he can beat back the isolationists and go to war with Japan, and it will be no time at all before we are at war with Germany too. That Churchill is licking his lips right now.”

“Don’t say that,” said Mutti. “You don’t know that. You just hate all politicians. Just don’t say that.”

Vati stopped talking, stared at the radio and looked at me and my sister.

“You’re right. I shouldn’t say that. Not in front of the children.”

He went to Mutti and gave her a kiss and hugged my sister. He roughed up my hair and went to his study in the basement with the schnapps in his hand. 

There was no school the next day, and we were all in front of the radio just after noon because that was when the President would talk with Congress. We had seen the newspaper pictures of the damage to our ships at Pearl Harbor and the big headlines about Japs and the sneak attack and how they were also attacking other places in the Pacific. Congress, Vati said, could declare war back at the Japs.

So, Congress could get even with them, I said, and Vati said yes.

I hadn’t heard the President before, so it surprised me that he didn’t talk the way we did. He sounded like Freddy’s mother, the one who said I was a dirty jerry. If a word ended in an “r,” the President said, “uh,” and he stretched out his words a lot. I was going to say something about that, but Mutti shushed me, and we heard him tell us about the day of infamy, about severe damage to our forces, attacks in many other places in the Pacific, and how we would win absolute victory over the Japanese Empire.

Right after, the Congress declared a state of war.

The next day I went back to school, and everyone was talking about the war. Nobody much liked Fatso Perkins, but he had a brother in the army, so we asked him a lot of questions about the army. Fatso told us how good his brother was with a carbine which was an army gun and said how his brother would kill Japs and Huns. Stosh told me later that I was a Hun, so I hit him in the stomach and called him a dumb Polack, but we made up later.

Inky stayed mostly with the other girls that day, but she walked home from school with me and Stosh and Freddy. Freddy was still my number one friend, but we always said goodbye at the bottom of his street so his mother wouldn’t see us together. Mostly we talked about Pearl Harbor and how the President said the Japs had hurt our military.

 Inky talked about all the sailors who died on the Arizona. She was good at putting herself in other people’s shoes and told us how bad off all their families must be. She said she cried for a day when her cat died. Think about how it is with people. So, we did and were all sad when we broke up to go home.

Mutti told me to shovel off snow that collected on the driveway, and I didn’t argue with her about missing my programs. They would probably be interrupted by an “important announcement” anyway. I cleaned off snow all the way out to the street where the plow made it thick and felt good about it. Better than thinking about the war.

Vati drove home just before supper. He was in a better mood than the night before and gave me a dime when Mutti told him I’d shoveled off the snow. My sister was sleeping over with a friend, so it was just us at supper, which was very quiet. I had lots of questions about what I had seen and heard that day but waited because I wasn’t sure about Vati’s mood.

After supper we sat around the Philco to listen to the President’s fireside chat, which was number nineteen since he became President. He sounded pretty much like last night, except that he seemed to be in the room with us, and it was like he was talking right to me. The President explained all the things that were going on in the Pacific, how we were already preparing for the war effort, what was happening in Europe, and how we were all ready for whatever we needed to do. He was very calm and comforting, and I memorized that he said, “So we will win the war and we will win the peace that follows.”

Mutti grabbed Vati’s hand as we listened to the radio, and Vati covered her hand with both of his. It wasn’t hard to figure out what they were thinking about.. Mutti’s sister lived with her mother in Germany, and her brother was in the German army. Vati had family living near Hanover, a place in Germany.

When the radio returned to “normal programming,” Mutti and Vati moved to the kitchen and talked. I was laughing at Fibber McGee and Molly and not so worried after the fireside chat. I got to stay up past my bedtime.

The next few days after school Freddy and Stosh and I caught the trolley down to the recruiting station by the green and watched to see who we knew was signing up to join the Army and Navy.  The day after Pearl Harbor, young men enlisted to fight Japan. After the fireside chat, they formed lines to join up, and, after Hitler declared war on us Thursday, the lines got longer.

We recognized some brothers of our friends. They were excited and making clouds of smoke as they talked and joked on the icy air. They wanted to get Japs and kill the Krauts and pretended to shoot each other as they pushed through the line. We were throwing snowballs at them from the corner of the building when we saw Hansi’s mother rush over from the bus stop, all red in the face, and bang into the glass doors of the recruiting station. A few minutes later she came back out dragging Hansi’s brother, Stefan, by the ear so he couldn’t get his footing in the slush and skidded on his knees. She was screaming at him that he was only sixteen and had to stay with her. That got a lot of laughs from the boys in line.

That Saturday, Inky asked me if I would come over to say hello to her big sister home from college for the holidays. Her name was Liesel, and she didn’t have a nickname. It was just Liesel. I think I was in love with her from the first time she came over to babysit me and my sister when I was about six. She had black hair and blue eyes like Inky, she sort of glided when she moved like she was on skates in the living room, and she didn’t treat me like a kid. Liesel listened to what I said, smiled at me and sometimes touched me when she talked. She was sort of famous for being a girl pilot and ,most of the kids in school knew her. Willy like her too and said she was stacked, but I didn’t care. I thought she was special.

We sat together on the green couch and she asked me what I was doing and I told her nothing, and she laughed and asked me again with her smile and I told her about going to the green and being worried about the war and what we were reading in our English class. We talked a lot, and she said she would finish college next year and that she hoped to have her commercial pilot’s license in the spring. I knew she was crazy for airplanes and thought Lucky Lindy was a hero, and she cried when Amelia Earhart got lost in the Pacific. I told her that was great, and she hugged me and gave me a kiss pretty close to my lips. My face felt like I had been standing in the wind for five hours.

After we were really at war with Germany, Mutti and Vati got very busy. They both wrote lots of letters, and Vati told me he was sending telegrams to his family in Germany. He told me he could do that from his office on Prospect Street. Because we had a home telephone party line, we had to keep our conversations short and not talk about certain things. Vati cleared out some shelves in the basement, and Mutti shopped for sugar and flour and things they said would be hard to get soon. He showed me the secret place in his closet where he kept wichtige papiere and some gold coins. He didn’t trust the bank.

Every Sunday we would have a big meal with some of our relatives, and I’d get to play with cousins. One had a twenty-two and we would hunt squirrels in the woods behind his house, or play blackjack, or just walk on streets we didn’t know. The way it worked was that we would have the big meal soon after church with all the food I liked best. Pork with thick brown gravy. Red cabbage. Spaetzle with gravy. All kinds of vegetables and potatoes. And deserts that the women would try to outdo each other with. About three o’clock, the women and men would separate, and us kids were free until it was time for cold cuts. The men would drink schnapps or kirschwasser or whiskey and talk and, if it was cold and wet outside, we could stay and listen.

After the war began, Vati and the men would sit behind closed doors to talk. They weren’t silly or laughing when it was time for cold cuts, but serious and quiet. By then, it was dark outside, but it was dark inside too.

Vati had a little desk with two comfortable wooden armchairs in the corner of the living room that he called his upstairs office. Friends and, sometimes, students came to visit and talk. He didn’t mind if I sat on the floor by the Philco when visitors came. He had his serious conversations in the basement office. The day after Liesel gave me a kiss, in late January, Paul Schafer came for s visit after cold cuts. His family lived next door to Inky’s, and he helped take care of our yard while he was in high school. I think Vati helped him get into Yale. I knew he was captain of the varsity lacrosse team because I’d see him at home sometimes in his white sweater with the big blue “Y,” and he’d talk about his games. He was like Liesel and talked to me like I was a real person and not just a kid. I liked him.

I was pretending to fiddle with the dials on the Philco, and Paul talked to Vati about the war and how he hated the terrible things Hitler was doing in the occupied countries. He felt it was his duty to join the other young men who were enlisting and serve his country. He might have German parents, but he was just as patriotic an American as anyone else and he wanted to fight. He wondered what Vati thought.

Vati nodded his head and smiled at him.

“Paul, I’d be glad to be your sounding board on this matter. I’m aware that you are doing well, on dean’s list, and it looks as though you’ve redeemed yourself after your freshman year.. You haven’t had any more problems in that area, have you?”

I peeked over and saw that the back of Paul’s neck get really red, and he squirmed in his chair.

“Uuh, the demon rum,” he said like it was serious and funny at the same time.. “That was a big mistake and I’m still trying to live it down. But it happened only that one time and never again. It’s over.”

“And the girl?” asked Vati.

“Amicably resolved. She’s living with her grandmother in Haddam.”

“Splendid,” said Vati. “I’m glad for you that it’s been worked out. Now, to your immediate future. You’re scheduled to graduate in June, correct?”

Paul agreed, and Vati asked what his major was.

“Electrical engineering with a minor in German.”

“The dean tells me your grades are good. Honors quality.”

Paul shuffled in his chair and said, “I think that’s right.”

Vati asked Paul if he thought he would be more valuable to his country now or in June as an honors graduate with an engineering degree from Yale.

“Keep in mind,” said Vati, “ that the military will be requiring many young officers quickly. I suspect they’d snap up an athletic Yale graduate in engineering with the speed of light.”

Paul just shook his head and said of course he’d wait until June. They talked more, and Paul thanked Vati. He said ‘hi’ to me as he left.