Bettina

22Apr12

Another small memorial to a person with an unknown fate. Bettina was my my best friend when I was in my early teens. Early puberty not an easy time for most people; in my case it had turned me into a highly combustible package of shyness, insecurity, defiance and yearning. She picked me; I didn’t [...]

Filed under: 1980s, Friendship, Germany, Youth   |  Closed
Tags: adolescence, friendship, hippies, mental illness, pot, punk, school, women

Family, lost and found

17Feb12

You might have noticed at this point that my family was more of the “unhappy in its own way” kind. Helmed by parents whose own parents had never shown them much affection, which meant they never learned how dispense it themselves, my family was an archipelago of six individuals with few bonds. We were four [...]

Filed under: 2000s, Childhood, Germany, Third Reich, World War II, Youth   |  Closed
Tags: Brighton Beach, family, friendship, isolation, loss, mortality, sadness, sisters, unhappiness