I am quite happy that I am back creating cards and I am loving that! I thought, as well, about this group and how many wonderful writers are out there and people like Alex who lets everyone have a voice on anything! I am blown away how there are over 200 people who participate on this website and I try to visit as many as I can but I fail at visiting as many as I want to. I am happy that I am doing the best I can at present and I thank everyone who looked at my blog and not tear down my horrible grammar etc... I have a tendency to write the way I speak and can leave errors in my hurried manner:) I thought I would write in the next few months about my mom whom I believe has led an extraordinary life. I will also try to do some highlights from the good to the bad and to the ugly (I can't tear myself away from film).
My mom was born February 10, 1928. Her name...Elfriede (elf-free-de) Ruth Ortmann. Her grandmother-her mother's mother, found my mom to be special and named her. Her name "Elfriede" is special. "Elf" means 11-for the 11th month of the 11th day of the 11th hour when the First World War ended. "Friede", in German, means freedom and this word my mom took strongly to her heart. She was baptized in the Lutherstadt church where Martin Luther nailed the 95 thesis to the door. She grew up in Germany before the wall, when Germany was changing into something horrible. She had a wonderful childhood in the country side near Wittenberg. Her love for her grandmother was strong and loyal. As for the other grandmother, her father's mother, ...not so much. This grandmother, who had 17 children with only 4 reaching adulthood, was one tough cookie who did not care for my mom and once walked across the street to just slap my mom on the ear. If you saw a picture of this lady you would see why my mother would distance herself from her. The funny thing is that the artistic side and the love for the finer things came from the bad Oma, as I used to call her. The grandfathers? Her grandfather on her father's side never spoke a word and just sat in a chair and would sleep. Her mother's father was the kindest man who owned a farm and bought a small carousel and would never charge the children to ride the carousel. He was kind and thoughtful and my mom always was fond of her mom's parents. How sweet the days of school, playing in the snow in winter and swimming at the local old quarry that filled up with cold spring water. Who knew that she would be taken from her home, watch her brother die and her other brother die of his wounds(so did 176 others that day). Who knew that she would be in Hamburg and Dresden when the bombings started or that she would suffer at the hands of the Russian soldiers....who knew. Throughout it all her love for freedom and her loyalty to family drove her on and created one strong woman.
