It seemed in the early
to mid-1970s, I never lost a moment, I slept a scarce five hours a night, and
only one with a makeup structure of iron cold dead sleep, and that had to
settle me down, like it or not. I was always anxious, on the move, more energy
than ten-beavers building dams. I had
visited Luxembourg, Belgium, France, Switzerland, while stationed in Germany between
1970, and 1976, and now Garmisch was now on my list. Garmisch-partekirchen, it
was where the 1936 winter Olympics took place, a quaint little village that
dated to about 1200 A.D., and during WWII, it served as a major German hospital
for German troops. In the 13th
Century, it was ruled by prince-bishops of Freising; and it was next to
Austria, and the highest mountains in Germany, to which was Zugspitze.
It was on a long weekend holiday, I stopped Cody’s reading
lesson, and I had given him dimes for every page he could read without a
mistake, Shawn, the other twin boy, never seemed to need assistance with his
reading skills. Matter of fact, in an international test, he scored 93%, for
his age level in aptitude.
I had intentions of selling my car, but
I had it fixed instead, and wanted to make one last trip while in Germany, it
was early spring of 1976, and Garmisch, Germany was my selection. And so I put
aside my laundry money, Cody’s reading for dimes, and filled up the gas tank in
the car, a 1967, VW, dark green, filled a leather bag with traveling clothes
for the whole family a suitcase older than Methuselah, and put one item of
clothes in it for each of the boys, myself, Zaneta, my youngest child born in
Frankfurt Germany, a year prior and off we went: wife stock and wheelbarrow of
a car.
Garmisch was only a few hundred miles
away, it was a resort area in the sierras. I had on long underwear and a dark
sweatshirt, a car full of groceries. We barely made it up a few mountains to
the Township of Garmisch, but by noon we had: even having a few times to push
the car when it stalled, then back up those last few gradations; it appeared to
me, the effort would kill the motor and we’d end up walking, but fate would not
have it that way, thank God.
After settling in our hotel and having a
meal we ended up walking the hilly countryside in Garmisch that afternoon,
which was a long weekend, I think the Fourth of July.
There was no snow on the ground, so the
skiing was over for the season, and most of the hotels were half rate, and most
were half empty. Shawn in one hand, Cody with a thump in his mouth, on the
other side of me, we climbed the hillside. When Cody got tired of his thumb,
then it fell back into my hand, Shawn’s hand never left mine, and it was as if
we were two peas in a pod.
The hills were green, and the path up
the hill was of laid cobblestone, and alongside was a wooden fence, fencing in a
cow meadow. And Cody and Shawn fit right
into the countryside with the Germans, blond hair, colorful eyes, milky white
skin, and strong bones, their grandfather from their mother’s side being of
German stock.
The meadow glowed, all around the boys
they were luscious in the midst of this enchanting beautiful countryside.
We had stopped alongside the fence, Cody
had spotted a cow with a big bell around its neck, and I think he wanted to
dingdong that bell, he had endless energy like me. I had little patience with
chance things, and Cody ran under the fence to the cow and Shawn followed him,
quicker than a jackrabbit, —and it scared me a bit but I let it be, and Cody
jumped back, and Shawn froze in place. The cow was so huge likened to an
elephant, thus came a young boy above ten years old, ran up to the boys spoke
in a German dialect, I could understand some of his words, I made them out to
be, “Don’t fear the cow, he’s friendly,
he’s my cow…” thus again, I left
well enough alone lest I doom the moment
of fun running after the boys, and bring more unease into the situation than
need be, and the boy, the German lad, looked at me, and smiled, we talked some,
with expressible connotations, more so than pure language: the boys for all intent
could have been a lost relative.
The boy kind of bowed and marveled
knowing that they, or we were beyond the deliberate creation of any language,
and understood one another. And I expressed the underlie beauty of the
landscape, and the boy beamed and ran off, and Shawn and Cody, had now, and
forevermore, penetrated the German culture.
That evening at the bar-restaurant, a
fiddler and his son were singing and playing a tune, I had ordered a beer for myself,
and some sandwiches for the boys, and coke, and they felt so free and connected,
having cleared their mind of the day, serenely joined the fiddler with his son,
and danced to the melody being played. It was delightful to see them both
untroubled by the realities and grievances of adult life, this evening they had
their say, and the last word was theirs.
No: 1065/5-20-2014 / Reedited 10-2016
