My grandmother passed away two weeks after I was born. She was only fifty-seven years old. Her name was Barbara.
So, what's the story? My mother and her two sisters were born as illegitimate children — the scarlet letter that haunted my mom throughout her life. The sisters grew up in a stout Catholic neighborhood. Everyone went to Sunday mass and whispered behind the girls' backs.
My religious mother resented my grandmother for her sins of the flesh that led to impure conception, as they say in the church.
The family was poor and often starving because the girls grew up in war-torn Germany during World War II. Access to food sources was scarce. It was bleak and scary. Money wasn't worth much, and survival happened mainly through bartering on the black market to get essentials.
They often had "potato soup," meaning they cooked one or two potatoes in water and rationed the meals. Other times, they got a loaf of bread and some cabbage. To add insult to injury, my mom was tasked with going to the black market to get cigarettes for her mother.
My mother also resented her sisters. My Aunt Betty, the oldest, continued the tradition and conceived three children out of wedlock by three men; my Aunt Christa, the younger sister, remained childless. According to my mom, she was my grandmother's favorite and "fat" because she got extra leftovers when there were any.
Even Christmas gifts were bartered one year, and the children were left with nothing.
They lived in a one-bedroom flat in a turn-of-the-century apartment building. Everyone spent their time in the kitchen; the bedroom had three beds: one for my grandma, one for my great-grandmother who lived with them, and the third for the girls. There was no bathtub or shower. They shared a toilet in the hallway with the neighbors of the adjacent flats.
I grew up listening to the somber tales of my mother's childhood and her traumatic experiences growing up in a war zone.
My mom's source of solace was my great-grandmother, the family's matriarch. She ensured that the girls went to school and attended Catholic mass and confessions.
Sister Bernadine was a nun who lived in the convent adjacent to the local church. She took my mother under her wing and loved her despite her being born out of sin. I met Sister Bernadine when she was in her eighties, running a local orphanage. She was passionate and energetic.
When I was little, we often visited my great-grandmother, "little Oma," who helped my Aunt Betty raise her three kids. They were still living in the same World War II flat, sharing three beds and a stinky toilet with the neighbors in the same corridor.
Little Oma's favorite ritual was drinking coffee with dark roasted coffee beans freshly ground for every cup. I loved the aroma of the coffee grounds.
During these visits, the women often reminisced about the war times and the late Grandma Barabara. According to them, Grandma Barabara looked forward to my birth. She was also fond of my father. He elevated my mother into the middle class by marrying her before she got pregnant and held down a job to feed his family.
Grandma Barbara lived just long enough to hold me as a newborn. Growing up, I knew little about her other than that she was a loose woman, a cautionary tale.
I found a stash of old documents tucked away in a cigar box when I was older and discovered that she had been married to a man named Peter, who left her before the birth of her oldest daughter. Nobody ever talked about it; being divorced was also a cardinal sin for Catholics.
I also found an old card deck that had faded to yellow. When I asked my mom about the cards, there was a pause.
You must know that throughout my childhood, I could see people's auras — I still do — and I had lucid dreams of my Grandma Barbara showing me decks of cards and coffee sediment.
Strange! I had no clue what it meant, but kaboom, it suddenly made sense. Seeing auras was my secret, and so were these vivid dreams of her.
I will not bore you with over-interpreting these phenomena and go Woo-woo on you, but I feel, without a doubt, that there's a psychic connection between my Grandma Barbara and me.
Maybe she passed these gifts on to me. I still dream of her and feel her presence. It's pure — with a sprinkle of magic.
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