Flash back to age 6. That’s me on the wall with my cousin Daniel, while baby Michele is still in the playpen. In the years before this picture was taken, I was sickly child, constantly getting colds and coughs. One winter I got pneumonia four times and might not have survived to adulthood had I arrived in a pre-penicillin age. The doctor told my parents that they needed to get me out of Chicago to recuperate, so, like Heidi, I was sent off to the mountains. My mother was the only one of her family to emigrate to the U.S., so there were plenty of relatives in Switzerland. In particular, my uncle had two children, age 2 and 4, so his then wife (long story there), who is my favorite of all my aunts, took me in for many months.
Most memories of that particular visit, are sort of dreamy, composed of disconnected pieces.
When I arrived everyone talked and talked. I could understand everything, but didn’t have quite enough French to answer anything other than “oui.”
Daniel and I took wagons or tricycles across the road and coasted downhill at breakneck speed, across the road and down my uncle’s drive until we fell out in the grass. My knees and shins bore many injuries that I showed off proudly.
My aunt and uncle did things my parents did not do: My aunt sunbathed. My aunt fed us bircher in the kitchen for a special meal before being sent to bed so the adults could eat without us. My uncle sometimes arrived home for lunch … everyone scrambled to get a perfectly set table with the knives and forks perfectly aligned. Most of the time, he didn’t come home at night! Late one night, I crept down the stairs to spy because I had heard a commotion, which turned out to be my aunt and uncle completely red in the face yelling at each other. My uncle had brought a suitcase full of dirty clothes that my aunt was refusing to launder. My parents did not fight. Well, actually they did, but I didn’t figure out until I was a teenager that their gentility led to subdued, almost invisible forms of conflict. No yelling. No getting red in the face. I was terrified, but the next morning everything was as if that scene hadn’t happened.
One story I remember perfectly. Exploring one day, I watched the farmer up the road putting hay in his barn. He invited me to return later at milking time, so I rushed back to get Daniel and the two of us watched the milking. The farmer gave us a big cup of milk… which was hot! He laughed and laughed at our surprise. After a lovely time, we went home, only to find the entire household in an uproar over our disappearance. My uncle had gone down to the village to find the lost children. Lots of scolding ensued and we were put to bed with no dinner as punishment. Daniel cried and cried, but I was able to console him by reminding him of our secret. We had actually had dinner, I told him, because we had each drunk a big cup of hot milk. So the punishment wasn’t really happening, though no one but us would know.
After about 5 months, a healthy me was returned to my normal family, where adults did not lie around sunbathing, where children ate with the grownups on tables no one fussed over too much and where any yelling that happened belonged to child voices, not grownup voices. Interestingly enough, I’ve noticed that I have a different character in my French-speaking life. I’m much more likely to raise my voice.
Funny how language and personality connect. I have a good friend from Germany. In America she us loud and vulgar and curses at full volume but in her native language she can't cuss. Those words are too real to her.
I just love this story. Your childhood memories are still with you and inform your understanding of human behaviour. Interesting that you worked out you had had dinner via the milk....
I also had pneumonia as a child pre penicillin!!!!! I was sent to a warm climate to stay with my namesake aunt. When it was noted that my asthma attacks ceased in this climate, the whole family moved to Broken Hill - out in the desert of NSW in Australia.
It almost seems like you had two very separate childhoods this way and both good. You were very smart in figuring out your "consolation prize" of an early dinner with that milk!
October 1st, 2014
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I also had pneumonia as a child pre penicillin!!!!! I was sent to a warm climate to stay with my namesake aunt. When it was noted that my asthma attacks ceased in this climate, the whole family moved to Broken Hill - out in the desert of NSW in Australia.