Tag Archives: WWII

Morning sky drawn in sidewalk chalk

Posted on February 6, 2016 by pinklightsabre

Passage from Dover to Dunkirk, via Reims, to southern Germany Past the old vicarage down the hill in time for the last of the owls, bending at the bottom through a valley to the lake for disabled anglers — No … Continue reading →

Posted in travel, writing | Tagged aging, cats, chalk, cliffs of Dover, death, fishing, Joan of Arc, Pink Floyd, poetry, suburbs, Thomas Becket, travel, war, WWI, WWII | 11 Comments

‘Strangeways, here we come’

Posted on October 20, 2015 by pinklightsabre

When I lent Benny’s dad Christoph a book on German history and explained the author’s premise, that too much focus had been placed on the Hitler years, he said that’s because no one told them what happened, no one talked … Continue reading →

Posted in travel | Tagged European travel, German history, humor, Memoir, Schengen, Strangeways, The Smiths, traveling with kids, UK travel, Winter Time, Wordpress, work-life balance, writing, WWII | 38 Comments

Meet me at the cemetry gates

Posted on September 30, 2015 by pinklightsabre

We dropped the kids off for their first day of German school, their first class French — French taught in German — and I walked to the cemetery by the Realschule, where we’ve started our third week of German classes, … Continue reading →

| Tagged death, expats, fall poetry, foodie, French culture, German culture, home schooling, humor, linkedin, Morrissey, Music, parenting, poetry, The Smiths, WWII | 26 Comments

Once there was a way to get back homewards

Posted on August 9, 2015 by pinklightsabre

My dad told my 91-year-old grandmother, his mom, we’ve moved to Germany for nine months and she seems OK with it, she says. They live about 20 minutes from each other in Pennsylvania — my dad, his sister Sue and … Continue reading →

Posted in writing | Tagged Abbey Road, European history, family history, German and English language, German word for gift, Golden Slumbers, homeschooling, John Pearse, Memoir, Paul McCartney, Pennsylvania Dutch, supernatural, The Beatles, water birth, WWII | 4 Comments

Dangerous Heat to Build Across Germany, Poland

Posted on August 8, 2015 by pinklightsabre

A week without my cell phone now, breaking the habit of checking, responding like a lab rat to artificial chimes and chirps, the desire to be recognized. Benny comes at 5 and spends the night, gets right into the story … Continue reading →

Posted in travel | Tagged Besigheim, expats, foodies, German education, German history, homeschooling, Italian market, Memoir, Sekt, traveling with kids, WWII | 9 Comments

The coin of the realm

Posted on July 16, 2015 by pinklightsabre

It twists and shifts with the pace of a Rube Goldberg machine, drops men from boats to dangle in the sky, forest green figurines crouching, aiming, leaping — heroes in the minds of boys, heroes in living form some call sacrifice. A plastic American … Continue reading →

Posted in poetry | Tagged American patriotism, American vets, D-Day, history, military, Normandy, poem, poetry, Rommel, Rube Goldberg, war, war veterans, WWII | 9 Comments