Dear Diary,
Here it is, November. Gosh, where has my year gone! Everyday, every week, every month, I have these thoughts, plans, agenda which I plan to accomplish...........and it hasn't happened.
I did make my trip to Germany (Bavaria to be precise) in May to meet my brother. When I got off the plane in Munich around 8 am, it did take almost 30 minutes to get to the baggage claim section of the airport. That was such a long 30 minutes. Yes, I was dead tired having been up for 24 hours at that point. There was no sleeping for me on the plane. Then there were the international check points to go through. Having to pass by armed guards who scrutinized your passport is not something I am used to. As I walked down the last ramp to get to the public area, there he was, Stephen, standing right there in front of me. It is hard to describe my feelings. Sure enough, it had been 32 years since I last saw him. But it more than that. He held his arms out for the biggest hug. And we started up a conversation that went non stop for ten days. We traveled, went sightseeing, visited the rest of my family members, ate too much, enjoyed ice cream every day, beer and pretzels every afternoon, wine every night and never got enough sleep. Neither one of us wanted to miss a minute.
Stephen is such a fun and funny person. And he is a wonderful father and now a grandfather, and great dog walker. He did well in his career and between that and the social systems in Germany, he got to retire at 58. He missed a lot of his usual routine and time with his family to keep my constant company for my whole trip except for the three days I spent with my Uncle Walter and cousins on that side of the family.
Uncle Walter and I both cried when we said our goodbyes because we both knew that we may never see each other again. He is about 80 years old and has a few health issues. Uncle Walter shared a lot of family stories, although his English is not so good now, and we spent hours going though old family photos. And in his possession was a photo album that appears to have been left at my Grandmother's house when Mom, Tina and I were in Germany in January 1964. He gave it to me. I could not remember ever having seeing photos of my sister when she was a baby. And picture of my Mom shortly after I was born holding me. She was 29 or 30 then but looked like a teenager. There were also letters that I had written to my Grandmother in a shoe box. One of those letters was written shortly after the deadly tornado outbreak in April 1974. I was letting the family know that we were all OK, but how close the storms were to us. And I was excited about going to a school dance. That was the only one of those letters I opened to read and it was so uncanny since it was only one and half weeks early that again, the southeastern part of our country was slammed with killer tornadoes.
My brother is 61 years old now and I surely can't wait another 32 years before I go back to visit. We have traded a few emails since I have come back home, but he is not much on writing, especially since his grasp of the English language is waning also - since he is retired, not much need for it anymore. But every one of my family member's English is better than my German which consists of less than 100 words.
I will try to visit back here before the end of the year.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Happy New Year
Dear Diary,
Well, I am a tad late. As you can see, I didn't do a good job posting thoughts in 2010. Will I do better this year? Probably not, but the year is just getting started.
For the most part, I can say my 2010 was a good year. Except for the never ending fear from one day to the next that I might be without a job, I still live it up. I got in four trips last year. One, a regular jaunt down to Gulf Shores. Went on two adventures with Dick - another visit to Annapolis/Baltimore and then to upstate New York. I joined him for his 50th high school reunion in Saugerties. Actually, I attended two school reunions this year - my own 35th. I also got away for a few days to Daytona Beach and St. Augustines. This was my third visit to St. Augustines. I really do like that old city. I still haven't seen everything historical there is to see there.
The most profound event in my life last year was the birth of my great-nephew, Everett. And I am just on the sidelines, but I try to keep up with him daily. He has had a tough first 10 months, but he is a fighter and quite the good natured trooper. I don't get to see him nearly enough, but hopefully he will grow up knowing he is so dear to me.
The other earth moving news in my life is one I have written about already - finding out that my "Uncle Stephan" is actually my older half-brother. He real name is Steven - named after his father. It turns out, when he talks with our Mom, that is what she calls him. I think it was over five months after finding out this family secret that I finally wrote to him. I explained how upset I was about not knowing, especially since he has known most of his life. How I was angry that I missed out on getting to know him since our Mom basically had no contact with him after she move to the States after marrying Dad. My brother actually thought I was being over emotional, but hey, he has had 50 years to adjust already. We have written a couple of other times already, and I have been sending him pictures of my life. He and the rest of my family in Germany have been asking my to make another trip over there. It has been since 1979 and there are so many new family members to meet in person. I would very much like to take that trip. It is just so costly. And the price of gas seems to be on the $4 a gallon route again for this year, so maybe I should have purchased that ticket a couple of months ago.
I also would like to take another road trip with Dick to Minnesota. He has a friend from his early days working in NY who lives there. They still keep in touch. I can plan us a route that will knock off another five states that I haven't been to yet. Did you know that has always been on of my goals - visit all 50 states. I have only 17 more to go. The hardest one to get to will be Alaska (at least I have Hawaii in the bag). It sure will difficult to both take a cross-country trip and fly to Germany. I just need to not shop for any clothes or jewelry for a while, but probably can't put off buying tires for too much longer. Dang it.
Well, my lunch hour is up. Back to work. I will be back again. Just don't know when.
P.S..............and we had a very white Christmas in 2010. Snowed that morning for about 4 hours. It was quite nice. Didn't cause too many problems on the road, so that was good. Funny how we (us Americans) equate cold and snow with making a Christmas special when so many people in the world always celebrate Christmas in the middle of their summer.
Well, I am a tad late. As you can see, I didn't do a good job posting thoughts in 2010. Will I do better this year? Probably not, but the year is just getting started.
For the most part, I can say my 2010 was a good year. Except for the never ending fear from one day to the next that I might be without a job, I still live it up. I got in four trips last year. One, a regular jaunt down to Gulf Shores. Went on two adventures with Dick - another visit to Annapolis/Baltimore and then to upstate New York. I joined him for his 50th high school reunion in Saugerties. Actually, I attended two school reunions this year - my own 35th. I also got away for a few days to Daytona Beach and St. Augustines. This was my third visit to St. Augustines. I really do like that old city. I still haven't seen everything historical there is to see there.
The most profound event in my life last year was the birth of my great-nephew, Everett. And I am just on the sidelines, but I try to keep up with him daily. He has had a tough first 10 months, but he is a fighter and quite the good natured trooper. I don't get to see him nearly enough, but hopefully he will grow up knowing he is so dear to me.
The other earth moving news in my life is one I have written about already - finding out that my "Uncle Stephan" is actually my older half-brother. He real name is Steven - named after his father. It turns out, when he talks with our Mom, that is what she calls him. I think it was over five months after finding out this family secret that I finally wrote to him. I explained how upset I was about not knowing, especially since he has known most of his life. How I was angry that I missed out on getting to know him since our Mom basically had no contact with him after she move to the States after marrying Dad. My brother actually thought I was being over emotional, but hey, he has had 50 years to adjust already. We have written a couple of other times already, and I have been sending him pictures of my life. He and the rest of my family in Germany have been asking my to make another trip over there. It has been since 1979 and there are so many new family members to meet in person. I would very much like to take that trip. It is just so costly. And the price of gas seems to be on the $4 a gallon route again for this year, so maybe I should have purchased that ticket a couple of months ago.
I also would like to take another road trip with Dick to Minnesota. He has a friend from his early days working in NY who lives there. They still keep in touch. I can plan us a route that will knock off another five states that I haven't been to yet. Did you know that has always been on of my goals - visit all 50 states. I have only 17 more to go. The hardest one to get to will be Alaska (at least I have Hawaii in the bag). It sure will difficult to both take a cross-country trip and fly to Germany. I just need to not shop for any clothes or jewelry for a while, but probably can't put off buying tires for too much longer. Dang it.
Well, my lunch hour is up. Back to work. I will be back again. Just don't know when.
P.S..............and we had a very white Christmas in 2010. Snowed that morning for about 4 hours. It was quite nice. Didn't cause too many problems on the road, so that was good. Funny how we (us Americans) equate cold and snow with making a Christmas special when so many people in the world always celebrate Christmas in the middle of their summer.
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