57 Hölderlinplatz

I had spent six days on the U.S.S. America and then had taken a train from La Havre. In Paris, a Brit with a Cockney accent put me into a cab and directed him to take me directly to the correct train station for the next leg of my journey to join my bridegroom of two months in Stuttgart, Germany where we live while he served with the 7th Army band as a trumpet player.

That I had been sheltered was an understatement, and I found myself about to travel through two countries where I didn't speak the language so much so that I did tell a Frenchman I spoke French and he didn't. He had enough English to correct me.

I was terrified!

I was thrilled! Living in Europe had been a long-held dream.

My husband's arms were waiting at the Stuttgart Bahnhof and he took me to the room in the apartment where we would live at 57 Hölderlinplatz. It was over a bäckerei and the smell of baking bread reminded me I hadn't eaten for almost 24 hours.

The room was in a German couple's apartment. They had rented two other rooms. We would share the kitchen (I had a hotplate and an electric coil to heat water). The landlady would hate the smell of American cooking, such as it was, and come storming in to open the window to the cold December air.

We also shared a toilet. The landlady again did not want American toilet paper but provided newspapers which regularly clogged the toilet. I became adapt at holding my breath.

The room itself was attractive in a WWII German movie way. Two twin beds that could be made up as couches, a round wooden table, four chairs, an armoire that would not hold my clothes never mind my husband's and mine made up the furniture. The rug was a fine Persian one.

There was no hot water and no place to bathe.

I will adapt, I thought. I will make it all a game.

I can heat the water with the coil.

I will get a basin and wash.

At least during the cold weather I will use the windowsill for a fridge. The pigeons looking in the window seemed to approve my thoughts.

My husband needed to return to the base.

A half hour after he left I woke from a nap to male and female fighting or maybe pre-murder emotion. Then it stopped.

A knock at the door.

We had no locks on our door. I debated hiding under the bed, but decided to open it.

A couple, each being over six feet, stood there. They started to speak to me in rapid German, although I wouldn't have understood slow German and when I didn't respond, they raised their voices and repeated what they said.

I started to cry.

They both spoke excellent English and explained to me, Gunther was an actor and Regina on her lunch hour from Disney where she worked as a secretary was helping him rehearse a scene. We would become friends, taking walks as two couples on Sundays, laughing at the idiosyncrasies of our landlords. Sometime the engineering student in the room between theirs and ours would join us.

The winter was severe. Heat in the room was a unit of saving for our landlords, although they had provided us with very warm duvets. I had never seen a duvet but thought they were a wonderful.

One particularly cold night in February, we came home early and huddled under the covers. The lights were off.

The door to the room opened.

Our landlord came in with a flashlight and began going through our things.

My husband put the light on.

Although I'd been in an intensive German course for several weeks, none of the lessons covered the situation.

The landlord muttered "Enshuldigen Sie mich" as he backed out of the room.

The next day the Army was helpful in making sure we found another flat on Olgastrasse Although we went from paying $55 monthly to $70 it was worth it. It had hot water, a mini refrigerator, a stove, and an oil heater where we could control our own temperature. I never felt so rich, so lucky.