“I never asked. Have you?”
“Yes,” Dawn said in frustration, “but she always changes the subject.”
“Then you might ask yourself when and how you asked.”
“I just want to know the truth, Oma. Don’t I have a right to know?”
“That’s all well and good, but what would you do with the truth if it was given to you?”
Oma talked in riddles! “I don’t know what you mean.”
Oma pushed herself up from the wicker chair. “Then you have something to ponder, haven’t you?” She picked up her empty cup, said good night, and went back inside the house.
Over a breakfast of scrambled eggs, sausage, and biscuits the next morning, Oma talked about what her other “kids” were doing. Dawn couldn’t help but laugh at the idea of Granny, in her sixties, still being considered a kid. Uncle Bernhard had received a long-deserved prestigious award for grafting lime, lemon, and orange trees. Business boomed and their son, Ed, now managed vendor and customer accounts as well as advertising so Bernie could concentrate on his horticulture experiments.
Rumors circulated in Hollywood that Aunt Clotilde would be up for an Oscar. “Apparently the costumes she designed for some science fiction movie were out of this world,” Oma joked.
Aunt Rikka still lived in her apartment in Soho. “She says she has good light for her painting and plenty of subjects. She’s doing portraits now. She just finished one of a hoodlum from the Bronx with a tattooed neck and arms. She’s calling it
Mom took Oma’s grocery list and headed off to the store, leaving Dawn alone with Oma. Oma smirked at Dawn as Mom went out the door. “Am I babysitting you or are you babysitting me?” She got up from her recliner. “I have some watering to do. Would you like to go out in the backyard with me? We can keep an eye on each other.”
Dawn lounged on the swing. “You had four children, Oma, and they’re all so different.”
“More similar than you might imagine.” Oma tipped a watering can over a box overflowing with blue and red petunias. “All four were bright and good-looking. They all found their God-given talents. Clotilde and Rikka are both artists. Bernhard and Hildemara took to science.”
Dawn put her arm behind her head. “I don’t think I have any talent.”
Oma straightened and glowered at her. “How would you know? You haven’t tried anything yet. Other than soccer, which your mother said you play very well.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t think they have any professional women’s soccer leagues.”
Oma set the watering can down and eased herself into a chair. “You probably have a good idea already what you want to do with your life.”
“Your granny was reading books on Florence Nightingale at fifteen. I left home at fifteen. I knew what I wanted, or thought I did, and made steps to go after it.”
Dawn couldn’t imagine leaving home right now, let alone leaving her country. How had Oma done that? “What did you want, Oma?” Had she run away like Mom? Maybe that was part of the bond between them.
“I wanted a chance to make something of my life, and my father thought educating a girl was a waste of time and money. He made me quit school at twelve and sent me to work at whatever menial job he could find. He didn’t think I’d amount to anything. He sent me to housekeeping school in Bern to learn how to be a servant. It wasn’t what I wanted, but I found ways to make good use of the training. I was going to own something as grand as the
“
“My friend Rosie’s family had a hotel. It’s still in the family as far as I know.”
“So you had to give up that dream?”
“Not completely. I owned a boardinghouse in Montreal and helped build a forty-acre ranch specializing in almonds and grapes. If my father had pampered and petted me, I might have ended up staying in Steffisburg and waiting on him for the rest of my life.” She snorted and shook her head.
All Dawn wanted to do was get married and have children. It didn’t seem like much when compared to Oma or Granny or even her mother, who had become a successful Realtor. In less than three years, Dawn would be eighteen. She’d need some kind of workable plan for her future until her dreams came true, if they did. “The idea of going out on my own scares me.” The thought was daunting.
“Probably because you’re too comfortable.” Oma chortled. “Nice big room in a big fancy house with a swimming pool, everything taken care of for you. Why would you want to leave? The people I loved most told me to go. My mother told me to fly. Rosie couldn’t wait for me to have adventures. Even my employers, Solange and then Lady Daisy, both said I had to go. They loved me, but put their needs aside for my good. People either weigh you down or give you wings. I had to shove your granny out of the nest. If I hadn’t, she’d still be single and living on the farm, thinking she had to take care of me.” She looked annoyed at the memory. “I love every one of my children, and I did the best I knew how in raising them. I just wasn’t always the mother they wanted.” She let out a soft breath. “I tried to mend the rift with your granny, but…” She shook her head. “It’s easier to put up a wall than build a bridge.”
“Are you sorry you never got your dream, Oma?”
“I can’t complain. Sometimes we realize our dreams in ways we never imagined. I never thought I’d ever marry, let alone have children. I wanted an education more than anything. I don’t have a high school diploma, but I can speak three languages, and I’ve read more great books than most college graduates. It’s a good thing God isn’t limited by what we have in mind for ourselves. His plan is so much bigger. When you’re as old as I am, you have time to sit still and take a long, thoughtful look back over your life and see how God’s plan was also a whole lot better.”
“Jason talks about God the way you do.”
Oma raised her brows. “And how’s that?”
“Like God cares.”
“And you don’t think He does?”
“Well, I suppose so, but…”
“It’s too hot out here for a philosophical conversation.” Oma fanned herself. “Let’s go inside.”
Dawn followed Oma back inside the house. They sat at the kitchen table, the oscillating fan turned on high. “As I get older, I miss the Alps more. Then again, maybe it’s just the heat.”
“Have you ever gone back?”
“Once, when I was eighty-four. Rikka went with me and made drawings of the old Lutheran church, the schoolhouse where I went, Thun Castle. I was offered a job there once.”
“In a castle?” Dawn was impressed.
Oma snorted derisively. “As a maid who’d’ve been paid a pittance for the honor of working there.” She snorted again. “I said no.”
“I never knew any of this. You should write all this down.”
Oma pushed herself to her feet, took an old leather journal from a kitchen drawer, and tossed it on the table in front of Dawn. “Rosie gave that to me as a going-away present before I left for Bern. She told me to fill it with adventures.” Oma chuckled. “I didn’t expect to have any. So I filled it with bits and pieces of useful information, things I thought would get me where I wanted to go. And eventually, I suppose some of my ‘adventures’ made it into the pages too.”
Dawn opened the journal. Oma’s German script was as small and perfect as the Declaration of Independence, and she had made the most of every page. “Can you read some of it to me?”
Oma put her hands on her hips. “
