My sister was getting married under the heavens above on the beach and we would all have sand between our toes with the reception in the A-frame that had been rehabilitated that everyone loved and knew.
It was 2004, the tsunami had hit, and I had 3 children under the age of 3, we are living on Kadena AFB in Okinawa, Japan. My husband was the Director of Operations for the 33 Rescue Squadron and they had deployed to Sri Lanka with their HH-60's that could reach deep into the jungles with what ever it was they were doing. "Junk" had to loan her flack jacket to Anne Curry covering the news (I believe this is when that happened, not an Afghanistan tour (tour...nice word). "Sock's" was my mentor the Commander wife, the best I ever I met. I'd move Heaven and Earth if she asked me, she's a great example of a human being and True Goodness should be seen. We had a wife that was active duty Intel, Kelly-no exceptional name, and thought it would be a great idea to let everyone know she was special and had knowledge we, lowly 'spouses' that 'didn't work', was spreading chitchat that our loved ones and those many of us consider family still to this day were being shot at. It didn't matter if they were or were not, everyone in the helicopter world knows, when you go up, no matter mission or training, it's the down that matters and an auto rotate can't fix everything. It caused distress and fear which wears a fray in a psyche and it reflects in the home.
I was carrying my LittleGuy at my chest, the third time of it's use baby Bjorn, as I pushed my BrownNut and LoveBugMy in their double stroller up and down the hills of a tropical paradise, managing nothing and everything around me. What couldn't be seen by most was a horrific sight to some. The dead were grabbing at my ankles pulling me down trying to capture what was a happy life. Okinawa and the psyche are not for the faint of heart. There was only one place I ever found a peace there, up a medium sized hill under the lush jungle there's a waterfall, if you move a bit further into the jungle you can hear it. I was able to speak calmly to the dead that waved and flowed on that island in the most unexpected places where in despair families would jump off cliffs then have known what would happen to their bodies before their lives would be shortened, by a soldier.
I start making reservations for travel with my 3 little ones under 3 so we can attend my sisters wedding and the family can finally meet the newest member, LittleGuy.
And then I received a notice from the airlines that I was not 'allowed' to travel alone with 3 little ones under the age of 3.
My sister’s soon to be mother in law jumped as high as could and said, "I'll go help and travel with them!" in her beautiful German accent. I'd never met her before and she was going to travel across the world to help someone she already considered family, my 3 and me.
Her name was Friedel, her husband is Hans, my sister takes care of him now till his time.
It was the early 1940s, Friedal, her sister, and mother would never see her father again because he was Jewish.
Hans was lucky, he got to work on a farm, his father was a business man and not Jewish.
you either get on living or start dying young.
Friedel loved with a passion, her family, any activity put forth to her was never a chore. She loved Germany to her core and kept a picture at the top left of her collage above her desk of all her favorite people in the world, and only one place was represented her old home country, a lake with a fountain shooting water high into the air, street lamps lining the edge of the salmon coloured brick pedestrian way and stately old building of importance in the background, this photograph of this place she loved is flanked by two patches flying the German colours. This country Germany where Friedel and Hans met, they were lucky they were on the West side of Germany after the war. This country Germany that Friedel loved so much even though the real Nazis took her father from their family.
My mom said she had a pair of crocks from me to wear in the garden and told me they had been Friedel's from when she and Hans would visit and walk among the peace of birds and gardens when they would reminisce about the old times with truth in their hearts and being grateful for their families and always with hope we could have a new start.
Friedel’s pink shoes fit me just right.
Can we stop a war if done just right?
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