There is also, again, no joy, no delight.  I go down my list of things to do, and I actually do accomplish (most of) what I set out to do, but there’s no sense of accomplishment, only, on a good day, a sense of relief.  Can relief be unemotional?  For me it is.  One more check mark on my list, one more thing done.  I’m a good girl I am. 

Ständiger Ausnahmezustand, I am constantly on alert:  even while normal life passes me by, I am acutely aware and anxious to do the right thing, to not mess up, to not make a mistake which could be costly or irreversible.  Constant questions and double-checking: am I on the right train?  Is this really the right train?  Did I purchase the correct USB thing?  Did I insert it in the correct slot?  Or, on the train to Rottweil to meet my cousin yesterday:  I had purchased a Baden-Wurttemberg Spezial train ticket on which you have to write your name so it’s not transferable. There is a warning on the ticket that they may ask for your ID/passport.  PANIC:  I had just left my passport on the kitchen table because I thought I wouldn’t need it.  RELAX:  you still have your American drivers license.  PANIC: what if that is not good enough?  RELAX:  it has your name on it, doesn’t it?  And so on and so forth.

Accomplished so far since I arrived two days ago:  still at the airport I located a Tchibo store in Stuttgart, took the S-Bahn downtown and purchased the USB stick with SIM card at the Tchibo store on Schulstrasse in Stuttgart,  installed it while also charging the laptop at Starbucks (also on Schulstrasse, on the other side of Königstrasse).  Walked from there to Hauptbahnhof, stopping on the way at the church cafe my mother had told me about, considered having a little lunch but it was only about 11 a.m. and my stomach was messed up anyway and I wanted to get home so I could get on with other things on the to-do list.  Took the S-Bahn to Winnenden, bus to Leutenbach (PANIC:  I do have the house keys, right?  They are in my purse.  Yes, but are the keys inside the little key pouch thing??).  Unpack for a moment, try the online thing – works.  Change shoes and go back to Winnenden (catch the bus by lucky accident), wait in line for a haircut, get haircut, walk back to Leutenbach, get groceries on the way.  Take shower, try to get online – disaster because I hadn’t read the fine print (which wasn’t fine print).  Spent the next couple hours trying to rectify, in vain.  Meltdown, despair.  (That one wasn’t on the list.)

Yesterday, Saturday, phone calls with my cousin, figuring out that we would meet in Rottweil, about two car hours north of where she lives and about two train hours south of Leutenbach.  Online, I found a better connection = another phone call to say that I’ll arrive 15 minutes later (which allowed me to leave an hour later).  Leave the house, remember to take the painting for my cousin and the dress for my aunt (had to find the right size bag to carry both), catch the bus by lucky accident, get to the train station and figure out how to purchase the Baden-Wurttemberg Spezial ticket from the machine.  Ticket in hand, wait for the S-Bahn.  Double-check:  purse – yes, backpack – yes, big bag with painting and dress – yes.  Good.  On the S-Bahn with lots of VfB people who ThankGod were behaving themselves (pre-game).  At the Hauptbahnhof in Stuttgart then to the correct platform where the ICE was already waiting.  In the train, find a nice seat with table for laptop, get laptop out, listen to announcement, “Welcome onboard this ICE.  Please be aware that any special tickets, such as da-da-da and the Baden-Wurttemberg Spezial ticket, are NOT valid on this train.”   Pack laptop and get off train.  (This one wasn’t on the to-do list either.)

Grateful that I know how to read the train schedule, I find another train, regional train this time, which leaves 20 minutes later, albeit from a different platform than the schedule had said.  Call to my cousin – what would we have done without cell phones??? – to let her know that I arrive 40 minutes later than originally planned.   

On the train, I unpack my lunch and eat, in relative peace, until the train starts to fill with young people who apparently either were out shopping or just riding the trains and are now returning home.  Fortunately, most of them were drinking coke, only one of them came onto the train beer bottle in hand already.

In Rottweil, warm greeting by my cousin and her partner who whisked me away to a cute little cafe with “the best cakes in Rottweil”.  Conversation, questions, tired, an hour later back to the train station. 

While life is passing me by, and I am uninvolved, it is difficult for me to tune out other people’s conversations.  I listen to the contents but also to their tone:  there is a certain aggressiveness or bitchiness in the Swabian dialect which has nothing to do with the people – it’s not that they are aggressive or bitchy – or even the contents of what they are talking about, it’s just the way they talk.  And after a while it tends to grate on me.  I can’t not listen. 

I think, someday I want to be here, in Germany, and actually enjoy being here, I want to feel joy and delight and excitement.  There is much to enjoy but I can’t get to it.

~:~>~:~>~:~>~:~>~:~>~:~>~:~<~:~<~:~<~:~<~:~<~:~<~:~

Postscript, in the evening.

“upright and functioning, but somehow disconnected from what was going on. Aware and participating but not feeling” are the words Mark used to describe what I was trying to say above.

And I think I figured out the reason for the “not feeling”.  It is not so much that I am still in shock over my mother’s death. 

It is, I think, because I am here because she died six weeks ago.  I am here thanks to her death.  How on earth can I possibly enjoy my being here??  From the beginning = our first trip to Germany this year, in January, to be with her in Esslingen, I kept muttering to myself, “This is all wrong.  All wrong.”

All the time, with everything that is going on or that I see or think, I think “I’d like to tell her about this.”  I’d like to tell her about the crocusses and the snow drops that are pushing out of the dirt now.  “Did you see how the neighbors decorated their still-bare bush with plastic easter eggs?”  and I imagine her shaking her head and rolling her eyes.  Plastic easter eggs …

I’d like to ask her where she got that one handkerchief I found on the bottom of her wardrobe amongst a pile of other stuff.  Is it there because she was going to sell it, along with the other stuff, at a fleamarket?  Or was it there by accident? 

When the downstairs neighbor asks how my sister is doing and then proceeds to tell me that she (neighbor) saw my sister a few years back when she (my sister) came to visit my mother, “oh, about four or five years ago, I think” and then continues to tell me that she asked my sister how she was doing and my sister answered (and here the neighbor imitates a Hochdeutsch accent) “Ach, nicht so gut …”  -  I’d like to ask my mother what the hell she (downstairs neighbor) is talking about, considering that my sister hasn’t left the United States in about 20 years. 

I feel odd, unbefugt, so was macht man nicht, looking through my mother’s belongings, her belongings that now belong to my sister and me.  There is no Hannelore Bohlig anymore, only “Hannelore Bohlig – Erbgemeinschaft”. 

In September 2006, just a month after we met I traveled to Oregon to spend a week taking pictures along the souther coast with my father. And last June I was in San Francisco for a week to attend a professional conference. After I returned from the conference we both said we’d never do that again.

Fate it would seem, doesn’t like the word “never.”

Not only will we be apart for a week (171 hours and counting), we’ll be far apart. The Google Maps based distance estimator I found says it’s 4800 miles.

I miss her so much it hurts.

170 hours and 58 minutes.

So, with one reason after the other fizzing into “not a good reason” territory, another thing has slowly but somehow steadily been creeping into my dreams:  a rather strong desire to go places that in my memory are connected with my mother. 

I want to go to Lichtenfels, where she spent much of her growing-up years.  I want to visit the street where her mother used to live.  Not that ugly building to which my parents moved her after building it.  I mean the small, grey, old building on Diroll Strasse, with the small vegetable garden behind the house, and the cemetary across the alley.  That cemetary is where I practiced my math skills as a young girl: trying to figure out from the grave stones how old people were when they died.

I remember the apartment as dark yet filled with beautiful and light memories.  Checking with google maps, it looks like the building is still there.  Please.

From Lichtenfels, I want to go up to Staffelberg, the local Ausflugsziel, where we used to go to hike and walk and explore and pick flowers and breathe incredibly fresh and fragrant air.  This is where some 40 years ago, as a small girl, I fell in love with the little tiny asters, and Thymian which grows on the meadows and fields.  I still love tiny asters and Thymian.  I have even managed to grow both here in Kansas. 

From Staffelberg it isn’t far to Vierzehnheiligen, a stunning and beautiful basilica constructed in the mid-1700’s but the story of which goes back hundreds of years before that.  Vierzehnheiligen is where my mother explained to me one of the fundamental differences between catholic and protestant Christianity:  the difference in how their buildings (and the lives of their elders …) are funded.  Protestant churches are very simple because not much money was spent on buildings, etc.  Catholic churches, cathedrals, basilicas, etc on the other hand are splendid, built to glorify God (and once in a while in order to outdo the neighbor …), built with the sweat and money of the lowly catholic peasants who were then of course not allowed in said church, cathedral or basilica because they were lowly peasants. 

On the way from Lichtenfels to Staffelberg is Romansthal, a small hamlet of just a few houses and farm buildings - and the hotel where we spent at least one vacation (memories get blurry after about 40 years …), the Gasthof “Zur schönen Schnitterin”.  I have a rather sensitive nose and remember many things by their scent, and this hotel room is no different.  For many years I had the most wonderful, nostalgic memory of this scent.  It was many, many years before I finally discovered what it was:  it turned out to be my father’s soap (?) which smelled faintly of carnations, in a kind of manly way.  I still love carnation-scented soap (actually, only Roget&Gallet’s carnation soap). 

~:~

Then there is one place of which I have no memory because I was never there, but my mother told me about it, and I think my sister once visited there with my mother:  the Calwer Krokusblüte.  My mother was enthusiastic how beautiful everything was, and she took pictures.  There are at least two Krokus paintings among her pictures. 

The Krokusblüte is like the tulips in Holland:  famous but of course you never know too far ahead of time when they will be in full bloom.  Traditionally, the crocus bloom in March, earlier after a warmer winter, later after a hard one.   This one then is time-sensitive.

Our travels were safe, relatively comfortable, and relatively stress free. We arrived there (twice) safely, and arrived home (twice) safely. This is good.

Today, like our first day back three weeks ago, will be a long and tiring day. My body thinks it’s 3:20 in the afternoon when the local time is actually 8:20 am. Bedtime tonight will be around 8 pm, I think.

And it will be many days and weeks before the full impact of what has happened sinks in.

When Michele died everything that was her’s and ours became mine. I was able to take my time letting go of clothes or other potential keepsakes. I didn’t have to travel, and I didn’t have to make all my negotiations in a foreign land using a language that was no longer my primary language.

When my mother died my father was in a similar position as I had been with Michele. The property all came to him through no action of his. Logistically is was relatively easy.

With the death of Sibylle’s mother however, there are any number of factors which multiply the difficulty of managing her estate. Sibylle hasn’t lived in Germany for 20 years. Her German language skills have started to perish, and many of the matters she is now managing were things she never did before, so she never had the language for them to begin with.

She has had to navigate the notary system, trying to determine if she needs what is called a “heir certificate.” She has worked long hours with an incredibly helpful local bank to understand her mother’s investments, and to establish control over the accounts there so that she can continue to meet her mother’s responsibilities. She has reconnected with an old high school friend who has provided advice and answers. And she has started the unique process of sifting through her mother’s life to catalog and understand what is left.

All of this in the week following her mother’s funeral, all of this knowing that her time in Germany is limited – we fly to Kansas on Sunday. All of this with the pressure to feel like something is being accomplished.

I feel that Sibylle has accomplished a great deal. She has made arrangements to have high resolution digital images made of nearly 200 of her mother’s paintings. She has donated study pieces of her mother’s to the senior center where Hannelore studied painting. She has learned about her mother’s accounts and established control over them. Moreover she has developed a wonderful relationship with the account manager over her mother’s account, meaning she’ll be able to email or call with questions, concerns, and transactions.

On Thursday we traveled to Bürg to a small church that has a monthly coffee and cake fund raiser. Hannelore had taken us there before and Sibylle wanted to let them know of her mother’s death. We made a small donation in her mother’s name.

Earlier this week Sibylle and I went to the local newspaper and placed an obituary in the paper, and we returned to the funeral home to pick up the condolences book that had been signed by everyone attending Saturday’s service.

She contacted the Winnenden notary, who proved to be very knowledgeable and very helpful, to find out about the heir certificate and also how to respond to inquires from the government agency managing the banks. His suggestion to contact them in writing and ask for a written response, so that there weren’t any misunderstandings, was excellent.

Sibylle worked with the downstairs neighbors to make her mother’s garage space available, and to have them look in on the apartment until she can return to do more there. And she was able to give two orchids from her mother’s apartment to her high-school friend Gela.

We were able to transport some 165 of her mother’s watercolor paintings to a local photographer, who made high resolution pictures of them for us, starting a catalog of her mother’s work. Some of the paintings are stunning and her hope is to exhibit them here in Germany in the future, and perhaps use the digital images on calendars and cards to fund a foundation in her mother’s name.

We started a pictorial inventory of the apartment, largely to share with Sibylle’s sister, aunt, and cousin, so that they could select items they wanted. And this afternoon, just before leaving the apartment, I walked through each room with the video camera to capture as much as possible visually for later reference.

All week we have had contact with numerous people, all of who have been helpful, and many of whom have gone out of their way to assist us. I told Sibylle that I really appreciated the chance to connect with some ordinary Germany citizens, and that I feel fortunate that so many have stepped up to help us.

It has been a long week following the funeral last Saturday, and a long two weeks since her mother’s death on February 6th. Sibylle has accomplished a tremendous amount, all under time and emotional pressure. I am very proud of her and very grateful that I could be here to lend a hand.

At dinner this evening I told Sibylle that I felt badly about returning on Tuesday when she was staying until Sunday. I have been vacillating between returning home on Tuesday or staying the rest of the week with Sibylle. It just didn’t feel right to leave her, especially at this time.

So I called Delta again tonight. However, I took the time to hunt around on their site for a European or Germany telephone number to call. The German number had recordings in both German and English and explained that outside of normal business hours calls would be transferred to America at no additional charge. Not only was the call therefore free to us, the response time was quicker too. With the souther snow currently in the States I’m sure flights have been canceled or delayed and that Delta’s agents are working non-stop.

I was able to change my flight to match hers, and I was able to confirm that showing a copy of the death certificate when we check in would waive the $250 flight change fee. Now we have a week together in Germany to begin the process of closing her mother’s apartment.

Over the course of the past few days Sibylle has put a lot of thought and effort in to how best to honor her mother’s memory and to mark her passing. I think the result was simply beautiful.

The room was small without seeming cramped, with a low ceiling and a solid permanent feeling. In the front of the room her mother’s urn was on display on a low pedestal with a spray of white orchids draped over the top.

On either side stood a wrought iron candelabra holding about 14 tea lights each. Originally the room was setup with a center aisle, but we rearranged the chairs to place the aisle to the left side, making room for a display of Hannelore’s art work.

Using a borrowed wallpapering table (long and narrow) covered with a beautifully textured bedspread against the wall, Sibylle was able to display several of her mother’s watercolors, large and small. At one end of the table, on a small pedestal, we placed a laptop computer running a slide show of pictures spanning Hannelore’s life.

Among the attendees was a group of Hannelore’s friends, who had shared bowling, books, and travel. They each brought a single rose, and left them on the art table, scattered between beautiful paintings and more tea lights.

The room held twenty chairs and exactly twenty people came. One of Sibylle’s friends from Gymnasium, Gela, who helped us tremendously by providing the table and transportation today, also acted as the master of ceremonies. She opened the service with a few words about what was to follow, and then there was a beautiful, slow, violin concerto movement.

Sibylle delivered her eulogy next, talking about her mother, her travels, her being a painter, and how she died. Her cousin Isabelle read another eulogy next, written by Hannelore’s sister, Sibylle’s aunt Ilse.  Gela then spoke again explaining that we should all take a moment to think about Hannelore and offer a prayer if we liked.

After the service people viewed the slide show and looked at her paintings and shared with each other.

A very old friend of Hannelore’s had arranged for a coffee and cake reception at a nearby Bäckerei. About 14 or 15 people attended for about 2 hours.

I knew Hannelore as someone who was tastefully elegant, who enjoyed good food and conversation, and beautiful art. Today’s remembrance of her was tastefully elegant, displayed her beautiful artwork, and was combined with good food and conversation. It was altogether fitting and appropriate, and very beautiful.

“Geh aus mein Herz und suche Freud …”

 Das ist eines meiner Lieblingslieder. Es rührt mein Herz an, es erinnert mich an meine Kindertage. Damals schon hatte ich Freude an Farben und Papier und Buntstiften. Ich werde oft gefragt, seit wann ich male. Nicht etwa seit meinen Kindertagen, obwohl da schon Freude am Malen und eine gewisse Begabung vorhanden waren. Ich bin in einer kaufmännischen Familie aufgewachsen, da hat man andere Prioritäten gesetzt. Ich habe dann erst im Ruhestand die Zeit gefunden, das Hobby intensiver zu betreiben, habe dann auch das Glück gehabt, gute Lehrer zu finden, allen voran Hans Köhler in Stuttgart. Der Umgang mit Farben, Pinsel und Papier macht mir große Freude, mein Leben ist viel intensiver und reicher geworden. Ich begegne durch die Malerei interessanten Menschen, es ergeben sich gute, anregende Gespräche. Das heißt, ein Leben mit Kunst bedeutet eine andere Lebensqualität.

Geh aus mein Herz und suche Freud: Das ist es, was ich in meinen Bildern ausdrücken  möchte. Wenn man so will, heile Welt, und ich finde daran nichts Negatives. Im Gegenteil, es gibt immer noch so viel Schönes um uns herum, man muß es nur sehen wollen. Ich selbst gehe mit offenen Augen durch die Welt, ich habe Freude an einem farbenprächtigen Sonnenuntergang oder an dem ersten Krokus, der im Spätwinter aus dem Schnee herauskommt. Das gibt es vor der Haustür. Aber ich reise auch gern, und so gibt es für mich massenhaft Motive, die ich malen möchte. Ich arbeite häufig inmitten der Natur, ich fotografiere aber auch gern, und so halte ich oft im Foto fest, was ich zu Hause mit Farben gestalten möchte, wenn, zum Beispiel bei Studienreisen, die Zeit zum Malen zu knapp ist.

Zu den Bildern gibt es nicht viel zu sagen, jeder kann erkennen, was dargestellt ist. Bei den abstrakten Arbeiten kann der Betrachter seine Fantasie spielen lassen, da möchte ich niemand in eine bestimmte Richtung lenken. Ich male das, was mir gefällt: Blumen und Landschaften, das sind ruhige Bilder mit viel Stimmung.

Daheim war sie zuerst Ehefrau und Mutter, dann alleinerziehende Mutter. Sie ist dem Verein fuer alleinerziehende Muetter und Vaeter beigetreten und hat dort jahrelang die Wanderungen organisiert. Wir Kinder durften diese Wanderungen meist zweimal machen (und nicht immer enthusiastisch): einmal zum Ausprobieren, dann mit der Gruppe.

Ich habe sie mal gefragt, ob sie sich schon immer am Zigarettenrauch gestoert hat. Nein, hat sie gesagt, das kam ganz ploetzlich: Eines Tages, ohne Vorwarnung, im Buero, hat sie’s ploetzlich nimmer ausstehen koennen. Kurz darauf war sie aktiv im Nichtraucher-Verein. Jahrelang hat sie sich fuer die Rechte der Nichtraucher eingesetzt, Aufklaerungsarbeit betrieben, usw. In diesem Zusammenhang ist die folgende Geschichte bezeichnend: Meine Schwester hat damals schon geraucht, was natuerlich besonders schlimm fuer die Mama war (dass ihre eigene Tochter raucht!). Als die Mama nach Moskau gereist ist und die Vera gefragt hat, was sie ihr mitbringen soll, hat die Vera sie gebeten, eine ganz besondere Schachtel Zigaretten fuer sie mitzubringen – nicht zum Rauchen, sondern weil’s ganz besondere russische Zigaretten waren, die ihr Lieblingsautor zu der Zeit in seinen Romanen besonders oft erwaehnt, und weil die Vera zu der Zeit in alles Russische verliebt war. Hat die Nichtraucherin ihrer Tochter die russischen Zigaretten mitgebracht? Ja, hat sie. Die Zigaretten in der russischen Schachtel hat die Vera heut noch.

Viel Freud hat die Mama am gesellschaftlichen Zusammensein gehabt: gekegelt hat sie gern, zusammen zum Essen gehen, sich mit anderen Kuenstlern treffen, Fortbildungskurse jeglicher Art, Ausstellungen …

Aber sie war auch gern allein. Sie hat’s gut mit sich selbst ausgehalten.

Vor drei Wochen war sie noch im Krankenhaus, da haben Mark und ich sie besucht. Am Telefon schon, und dann auch im Krankenhaus, war ich erstaunt, wie wach sie geistig war: wochenlang hat sie auf dem Ruecken gelegen und weisse Krankenzimmerwaende angeschaut – da wird der gesuendeste Mensch krank! Geistig war sie aber immer voll da, immer noch interessiert an vielem, hat engagiert mitdiskutiert. Sie hat mir dann erzaehlt, dass eine ihrer Bettnachbarinnen sich bei ihr beklagt hat: “Mir ist so langweilig!” Die Mama hat nicht recht gewusst, was sie dazu sagen sollt, hat dann halt gefragt: “Ja, was machen Sie denn daheim?” – “Ferngucken halt …” Da hat die Mama zu mir gesagt, mit Enthusiasmus, “Mir wird NIE langweilig! Ich hab viel zu viel, uber das ich nachdenken kann!!” So hat sie sich geistig wachgehalten, deswegen war sie auch nach sechs Wochen auf dem Ruecken liegen noch voll da.

ALS Amyotrophe Lateralsklerose

Eine Krankheit, die sich tueckisch und langsam einschleicht. Weil die Mama Osteoporose hatte, hat sich alles am Anfang auf die Knochen konzentriert. Dass die Hueftoperation nie richtig geheilt ist, hat sich niemand erklaeren koennen – jetzt wissen wir, dass das schon ein erstes Symptom der ALS war. Oft hinfallen, stolpern, sich nicht auffangen koennen, wenn sie hinfiel – mehrere Untersuchungen in einer nuerologischen Klinik ergaben nur, dass es nicht MS war. Eine Kruecke, um stabiler zu sein, dann zwei, dann der Rollator … Sie hat sich dann nimmer gern aus dem Haus getraut, weil die Leute sie oft aus Gedankenlosigkeit angerempelt haben. Aber gereist, in ferne Laender, ist sie trotzdem noch.

Nach einigem Nachdenken hat sie mir vor drei Wochen gesagt: “Weisst du, eigentlich hat das schon im Sommer angefangen, da hab ich schon weniger Appetit gehabt. Ich hab noch dieselbe Menge wie ueblich gekocht, aber nur noch die Haelfte gegessen.”

Ueberwintern in der Turkei hat sie trotzdem noch gewollt. Aber da ging’s dann halt schnell bergab. Ich hab oft mit ihr telefoniert, und sie hat mir dann immer oefter gesagt, wie muehsam alles ist: Haende waschen, Fleisch schneiden. Aber sie hat sich auch an Schoenem gefreut: “Du solltest das Gemuese hier mal probieren! Das ist so viel schmackhafter als daheim!”

Dann der Anruf vom Krankenhaus, noch in der Tuerkei: “Frau Kuder? Einen Moment, ich verbinde sie jetzt mal mit ihrer Mutter.” Das war am 22. Dezember. Die dachten, dass vielleicht was mit dem Herzen nicht stimmt. Herz war aber ok. Am 28. 12. dann im Liegen nach Deutschland geflogen, dann ins Klinikum Esslingen. Da haben wir fast taeglich telefoniert. Ich hatte schon an Weihnachten ueberlegt, nach Deutschland zu fliegen, aber sie hat immer gesagt: “Ich taet mich riesig freuen, wenn du kaemst, aber es ist nicht notwendig – es waer ein Luxus.”

Mark und ich haben dann beschlossen, dass es ein notwendiger Luxus war, sie zu besuchen. Eine Woche lang waren wir in Esslingen, haben im Gaestehaus gewohnt, 5 Min von ihrem Zimmer. Einiges erledigt, Pflegeheime besichtigt, Fingernaegel geschnitten, und am letzten Tag noch Bilder gemacht.

Sie hat so viele Reisen gemacht, ich weiss ueberhaupt nicht, wo ich anfangen soll: Tuerkei, Portugal, Tunesien, Persien, Hawai, Vereinigte Staaten, Moskau. Den Schal hat sie mir gegeben, wo sie in Esslingen war. Der ist aus Dubai.

Jetzt ist sie da, wo’s keinen Unterschied macht, ob sie laufen kann, oder sitzen, stehen, essen, Arm heben. Ich stell mir das so vor: jetzt ruht sie sich erst ein bischen aus, die letzten Wochen waren anstrengend. Aber irgendwann steht sie dann auf, und guckt sich ihr neues Leben an. Bissle vorsichtig zuerst, Hals ueber Kopf war sie ja nicht, bissle vorsichtig, aber dann kommt so ganz langsam so eine kribbelige Vorfreude auf – eine neue Reise! Dass sie uns von dieser Reise dieses Mal nicht erzaehlen kann tut weh.

Trotzdem: Gute Reise, Mama.

We acknowledged it to each other several times today. And I know we are both taking comfort in the other’s presence here today, this week, in this place.

There is no one I’d rather be with more, no one I want to share this life with more, no one I care about more, no one I am more devoted to, no one I adore more, than my wife. Sibylle.

I love you Sibylle.

Happy Anniversary.

Funerals are different in Germany than in America. From personal experience I know that you can take the cremated remains of your loved one home and store them on the mantel, or where ever you choose. In Germany you must show proof that the remains will be interred. While it is possible to ship the remains to America, we must have a letter from a funeral home there stating that we will handle the remains in accordance with the law. The funeral master here in Winnenden as much as admitted that no one in Germany would follow up with the final disposition of the remains once they were in America, but he must have a letter in order to allow us to ship the remains.

We contacted a local funeral home in Manhattan and they were more than happy to provide the letter and to receive the shipment, all for no charge to us. Simple acts of generosity like this are incredibly meaningful to both of us right now.

Sibylle has navigated several official services this week. Two weeks ago she and her mother finalized a power-of-attorney document and made arrangements for a notary to witness the signature. The notary was supposed to provide this document to Sibylle only it hadn’t arrived before we returned to Germany this week. Upon opening her mother’s mail we discovered a bill for the notary service. It seems he would not mail the final document until he was paid. What made this a bitter pill to swallow was how he handled the bill. He knew that Sibylle was in America, and that her mother was going to be in the rehab clinic for at least three weeks. Sending the bill to her mother’s home address needlessly delayed getting this document.

In order to manage some aspects of her mother’s estate Sibylle needs either a heir certificate, which could take six weeks to be processed and delivered, or a power-of-attorney that extends beyond death. After contacting the Winnenden notary (the one responsible for the village where her mother lived) we learned that the Esslingen notary did the work since that is where her mother was when the document was signed. Through the Winnenden notary we were able to contact the Esslingen notary and determine that the document does in fact extend beyond death. The notary wasn’t aware that Frau Bohlig had passed away, but in light of that fact agreed to mail the document to her mother’s apartment ahead of getting paid. We should have it in hand tomorrow or Saturday.

The local bank her mother used has been very helpful and considerate. The account manager we’ve worked with has been patient and very generous with her time. And the funeral master at the funeral home has been incredibly helpful, answering any number of questions about how funerals work in Germany, as well as questions about how apartment leases are handled here.

Throughout all of these other concerns, Sibylle has been pulling together a service for her mother. We decided to have a small service this Saturday in the afternoon, and then later this spring, perhaps in May, a larger memorial service. Sibylle contacted the local Evangelish pastor to see about her (the pastor’s) participation. Unfortunately the pastor had some fairly set ideas about the structure and content of a service. Neither the structure nor the content felt appropriate for Sibylle’s mother. Sibylle said that she was glad we explored that avenue, as now she won’t wonder if an Evangelish presence should have been at the service. Everyone we have shared this decision with so far has been very supportive, so we feel like it was the right choice.

Each day this week we have spent the daylight hours making phone calls, visiting the funeral home, visiting the bank, and the notary, and spending time in her mother’s apartment. In the evenings we return to our very secluded, peaceful room in Bürg to digest what the day held, and to continue contacting people and planning for the next day.

It has been a long week, but ultimately, I think, a good week.