Life is a Journey: Live it (Part 42)

The other autobiography
In the backyard, they grew big beans, peas, cucumbers and potatoes. On the other side of the path which led to the wheat farms behind to their next door farmer, a source for food during the last world war, they had built a shed for chickens and pigeons. The wooden block prominently positioned always right in front of the door was covered in blood. Used to kill chicken it killed my appetite as a child to eat chicken.

The pigeons were the hobby of my grandfather and his father. They used them to win flying championships and when they got old cut off their heads to end up in a delicious meal. Under the apple tree was a swing and under the stairs leading up to the ground floor lived a pig. One next to a few grey rabbits. The one pig when fat would be slaughtered next door at their neighbour's house. A private butcher came, killed the pig, and sliced it into pieces. Each neighbour who had helped my family during the year would get their fair share.

In front of the stairs, a giant cherry tree would give all of us enough cherries for which we would come there all the way from Alte Wöhr, a more than an hour train ride. When my great-grandparents died and my grandparents were about to move out the house was sold and the profit made was shared between my mother and her siblings. The last time I was in that old house was when Aunt Helga Riedner married to Gerhard Riedner, the gardener in Aumühle cemetery; her second husband took personal belongings from the house to Wohldorf, Landstraße, her own house. Eva Weatherill and my mother were so upset about the behaviour of Helga Riedner and her husband from that time onward they would never communicate with each other anymore.

Relationships in my family background are not normal but true. To break the chain comes at a price, a constant battle. I hear of other relationship situations and see in families that cooperation is possible. If not pink harmony at least respect and understanding. Considering God declared in the Bible that he has not come into the world to bring peace and love but the sword to separate parents from children and brothers from sisters. This sword has cut right through my family.”

“Do you sometimes wish to have a better family and some kind of better understanding for each other in your family?” asked Franz Kleve, finishing off the last piece of his birthday cake.

“Very good question,” was my answer. I took a few moments to think. “Where am I today is where I want to be. I live my life not the life of others. Others might bathe in riches on earth but leave this place naked as they come huzzle and bustle for people left behind. Others have less than I have. Some are rich while alive, soon forgotten when dead, no footprints left behind. Here today heroes of their moments on earth but dust when their grave is eaten by worms. Others have accomplished wisdom, painted, researched and written never seen the inside of a Rolls-Royce poor men such as Vincent van Gogh, or Epikur, Seneca, Diogenes, Epiktet, Franz Kafka…people that left something behind we refer to today and see their words as meaningful wisdom valid still in our time and time to come.

You see when you chase money to become rich and powerful time is not in your hands to be powerful in wisdom. Wise people…I mean not wise in the sense to advise people how to become rich fast and easy…need time to observe, reflect and draw conclusions which is their wisdom…these people do not chase money and see their heirs fighting over it. The time to live is today. The time to conclude is today. The time to write down our conclusions for generations to come is today. Money is the expression of a will. It can be in our hands today and gone tomorrow. Wars in Syria or Ukraine have made rich people poor in minutes. When you have wisdom in your hand and heart no one can take it away from you. No sickness, no bomb. Write as much as you can and the chance to be remembered while you are gone for a long time is already high. Be a servant to people and people will surely remember you.”