Drei Katzen und ein Hund

Rain and damp met us upon stepping out of the Munchen airport this morning.  This felt lovely and soothing.  It is hard to leave the sense of home we feel with our layers of friends when tucked inside of these mountains below (so newly left).  Yet, bringing two daughters - the great granddaughters of Brunhilde (Julia) and Margot, the great great granddaughters of Kathe Erna Alma Schelper  (nee Seyffarth) and Erna Minna Anna Wien (nee Eberhardt) - feels like moving warmly close to quite another layer of home and place.   

We've been mostly sleeping since arrival to our apartment in Weiden in der Oberpfalz.  Three cats and a dog.  The syrupy thickness of fatigue drapes over our family.  I imagine both of my Omas with children in tow the day after the transatlantic crossings they made.  They have always helped me imagine myself in these scenarios too, and surely that is why I am here. How lovely to visualize the particulars, the overlaps, the details handed down.  Lovely too to consider their classy variety of dishevelment, as rain falls outside the opened window.  Edel is just waking after seven hours nap, Clover and Dinah still deep asleep at her feet, and Maudley scratches an ear on the floor next to us.  Naya is conversing with her "two Maxis," as she calls them now - Maximilia (Maxi) is a new friend in Bayreuth she'll soon meet once we move there end of August (our landlord's daughter there), and Maximilian (Maxi) is a friend from college who is sticking on this side of the ocean this semester.  Abhishek is just back from a walk down to the old city centre and keeps saying random German words aloud, and his cat Bertie is also striving to adjust to all the change.

I will fall asleep later with my Omas on my mind, and glad for my children & kitties near.