by M. E. Kerr
I regret so much that your father is blamed for giving Slater too much freedom. I believe that is what life is all about: being free.
Today I am sixteen! Beethoven too had his birthday today.
With much love, stars, your friend always, Elisa
P.S. Your package did not arrive yet. Mail is slow here.
January 7, 1935
Elisa dearest,
New Year’s Eve at the stroke of midnight I made a wish you would come back next month.
Everyone in school is excited that I got mail from Europe! My father is interested in what you have to say about how Jews are treated. He says it is hard to believe and that you must be in a small enclave where there is anti-Semitism. He remembers when he went to a wardens’ convention in Miami, Florida, last year there were certain hotels with “Restricted” on their signs outside. That means no Jews. That must be how it is where your grandmother lives. There must be many places that do not have those feelings, just as we do not have restricted hotels up north and the colored can use public bathrooms. (They can’t in our south, did you know that?)
My father says he stopped himself from saying he “Jewed someone down” when he realized it was offensive, even though it is not an uncommon expression for getting a bargain. My mother says there are many Jews she likes (her own doctor is one) but not living on our street because it brings down property values.
I don’t think I have ever been friends with a Jew, but I certainly would not mind that.
The prison board meeting was postponed to next month, and we will know then if Daddy will remain in Cayuta or what. If it weren’t for you, I would be praying he gets sent back to Elmira. Daddy was the one who got the band started there, and though they never won a Baaa, one year they came in second.
I don’t think I will ever know what Mr. Joy wrote to Seth. But Seth is acting completely different toward my dad. They both are acting different. I said to Seth, “What’s going on with you and Dad? Anyone would think you’re father and son.”
He didn’t think it was funny, I guess. He pretended not to hear. One night out of the blue Seth said to me that one thing neither of us should ever do is underestimate Dad. I told Seth I never did, did he? He said he thought everyone underestimated our father.
My mother notices them too but says they are close again because Slater Carr is out of the picture. Did I ever tell you she can’t say the word dead? She says “out of the picture, passed, crossed over,” anything but!
There is a writer I think you would like called Sinclair Lewis. Richard is very excited about him too and says Babbitt is the story of our parents’ hypocrisy. The main character, George Babbitt, sells people houses for more than they can afford to pay.
Richard says our parents are all conniving snobs. He says we overvalue them just because they are our parents. I don’t think my father is a bad man, but I can see why Richard thinks that, since his father takes people’s cars away if they miss a payment. When I finish Babbitt, he says, I can send it to you.
We had a very quiet Christmas. We had the usual tree indoors, but Mother did not think we should decorate outdoors because of Mr. Joy and also because Daddy’s fate is still undecided.
Please tell me what you are reading, and if it is in English, I can read it too. I would like to compare notes with you. I think you will be surprised at what a big poetry reader I am becoming. My teachers can’t believe it. They say they believe my friend from Germany made me more appreciative of it, and I say they are right!
Please write me often, as I will you.
Love and xxxxx, Jessica
P.S. Daddy is still sad and in the dark about what will become of him (and us).
P.P.S. Do you ever think of Wolfgang? I never see him anywhere.
February 1, 1935
Dearest best friend Elisa,
You will not believe this. This morning as I was dressing for school I listened to our local station. They play all the latest hits, and lo and behold on came the song with “your eyes in stars above” in the lyrics. I’m sure that’s the song Wolfgang sang to you—“The Very Thought of You.”
After school Richard and I went down to Dare’s Music Shop and listened to the song and copied the words down so you could have them. They are enclosed. I remember you said how you liked that song, even though you didn’t like the idea of your father trying to fix you up with Wolfgang. You probably would still have your eye on him if it weren’t for that, I bet.
I heard Wolfgang did not go to Germany yet but is planning a visit there. My mother heard it from the Schwitters’ maid, who is the wife of one of our guards. I never do see much of him.
I just want to rush this off to you.
Xxxxxxx come back soon…
Your dearest friend,
Jessica
P.S. Richard has a “push” on a German writer called Friedrich Nietzsche, and he is always quoting him. One line he quoted is when Nietzsche said, “As an artist, a man has no home in Europe save in Paris.” Now I would give anything to be in Paris with you, and I would go up in the elevator too.
Richard thinks he will be a writer and go there to live.
February 28, 1935
Dearest friend Jessica,
At times America, and Cayuta, seem far away, as though it were a long time ago that I was there. But here I am in Germany, and my poor country seems almost as distant and unreal.
Jessica, do you remember once we had a conversation about your mother wanting your neighborhood Judenrein? Remember that word? Jew free…There is a growing feeling in so many places now that Jews are the cause of all our troubles and that we should get them out of Germany. Now the signs against them are everywhere and get uglier every day. Your father is wrong to think it is just in one part of this country. I don’t think Americans know what is going on here.
I went with Vater to the All-German Farm Festival in the Harz. It is a major celebration in Germany. Farmers from all over assemble. We were invited to stay overnight with old friends of our family. With us were a man and wife, also friends of my father, the Schulzes, prosperous farmers from Hessen. We were having dinner when the eight-year-old daughter of our hosts refused to take a platter of sauerkraut and sausage from Mrs. Schulze. This little girl, blond, blue-eyed, and “cute” you would call her, in her school uniform, blue skirt, white blouse, shouted out, “I am forbidden to take anything from a Jew nose’s hands!” Then, shaking her tiny fist at Mr. Schulze, she cried, “Jew, you and your wife, leave our German house!”
Everybody was embarrassed for our hosts, who apologized profusely, and a servant then passed the food, stopping by each guest to offer some. The little girl, Gudrun, was sent to her room. You would think that would be enough of a picture for you to see what it is like here, but no! The next day the servant was arrested and taken away. Gudrun reported her.
Even if you are not Jewish, you feel the fear in Germany. Life goes on with crowds attending opera and theater. Jews cannot go to public events, cannot go to concerts or perform in them, cannot even sit in public parks. And then suddenly you see a Jew being shamed in public by a Nazi officer, or you hear of one whose windows were painted over with swastikas, the Nazi emblem.
Mother says because growing up I have lived so many places, I do not know and trust my homeland as she and my Omi do. They say this will stop.
We are probably going to rent an apartment in Berlin. I am not certain when we can return. It is not easy to come and go now, but my father says not to worry because he must continue with his work at Cornell.
So everything is postponed a little, and everything will be better soon, I keep hearing. Only my father does not say that. He does not say much, for he is too shocked, I think. I believe he is expecting Wolfgang and Mr. Schwitter to arrive here soon. He says he wrote warning them it is a bad time for anyone to visit Germany. What about us? I said to him, and he said that is different because this is our home. I don’t remember its being this way, and Vater said it wasn’t this way ever a
nd it won’t be for long.
It is peculiar that I miss Dietrich, because I did not have her long, but she made an impression, the same as you did, on my heart. My mother says when we settle down in Berlin, I can get a kitty, and she will take care of it while I return to America. She may not come when I do because it may take a long time before Omi is strong enough. Everyone is doing all they can to make me like it here, but I do not feel it is my Germany, and I miss you so!
With love and stars from your friend, Elisa
P.S. No longer can you greet or say good-bye to someone with the customary Grüss Gott. Now you must say Heil Hitler! Everything you say and do gets reported to police.
P.P.S. Remember me by being nice to a Jew.
March 9, 1935
My dearest friend Elisa,
You do not mention the package I sent you for your birthday/Christmas celebration. I hope it did not get lost in the moving.
There is some good news, some bad. Daddy did not get a demotion. He did not get a year-end bonus either, but he said with the times the way they are, he might not have gotten one anyway.
The bad news is he cannot have a band at the prison, not even one that remains in the prison and is never allowed outside its walls. This makes him very discouraged, because the music was always a morale booster for the inmates. (And Daddy too.)
He says that it is his own fault. I tell him that it is all the fault of Slater Carr. He says, “Maybe we can’t forget some things, but we can forgive them. After all, Mr. Carr had a life he missed. That was my mistake, Jess, thinking he had no one and would adjust to The Hill. But everyone has a life of some sort.”
Seth feels bad that Mrs. Joy has moved all the way to St. Louis, Missouri, where she has a sister! Of course J. J. had to go with her. Seth would travel there for Easter vacation, but we do not have the money, says Daddy. Not for that, he says, so Seth has taken an after-school job at Hollywood Hangout, and also an early-morning job delivering The Cayuta Advertizer. Mother is very proud of him. She would like nothing better than to see her son marry a “shoe Joy,” as she calls J. J.
Please let me know about the package. I can send another.
I am reading Goodbye, Mr. Chips by James Hilton for English. You would like it, I think. It is about a beloved schoolmaster like your Kai (I forgot his last name), who got you to read Les Misérables.
I wonder what you do daily. Can you give me an idea?
The only thing new about my day is that now I write you and also sometimes even hear from you (Hint! Hint!).
Love from your best friend in the world!
Jessica
March 23, 1935
Dearest Elisa,
Now I will tell you something amazing. Last night Daddy took me for a walk to Hollywood Hangout. I can count on one hand the times we have gone for a walk together, so I knew he was going to say something important. I never dreamed he would say what he said.
What he said was that my mother had one lung removed when we moved here because she had gotten tuberculosis! It was not the pneumonia that she was always talking about at all. It had to be this big secret because by law she would have had to go to a sanitarium since it is a contagious disease. Instead Daddy decided to keep her home and to keep it between themselves and a doctor in Rochester. She could not tell a single soul for fear news would get out and she would be sent away. She would never have told anyone anyway, since she was so ashamed, believing (wrongly) that only lower classes get it.
Over the Fourth of July on her regular visit to Rochester, the doctors told my mother if her next checkup bears it out, she no longer has TB! Well, she doesn’t.
That makes everything clearer, doesn’t it? I now know why she coughed so much, why Daddy took her walking every day, and why she kept her distance from me. No wonder I never saw them embrace anymore. They always seemed so frigid to me, particularly when across the street on the Sontags’ porch were the lovebirds.
Think of all the times I said they weren’t doing it, and you said they had to be doing it. No wonder poor Daddy got obsessed with winning the Baaa. He’d always wanted to win it, but after we got here, it seemed like all he thought about…and then his attachment to Slater came. Slater would make his dream come true!
I have promised Daddy you are the only one I will tell. He does not even want me to tell my mother I know. She is still humiliated and still believes only poor, uneducated people get TB. She was always so terrified someone would look down on her. After Daddy told me this, all I could think of was all the dirty books she kept under her mattress. I guess because she couldn’t do it with Daddy. And of course that explains the sleeping porch and why they weren’t lovey-dovey and why I thought she was an icicle.
When I say it explains almost everything, it doesn’t explain why she couldn’t cough up a few words of affection now and then. That part makes me mad! It also makes me determined to always let the people I love know it. No matter what happens in life, we should always show our feelings, I think.
You have helped me be able to do this, in case anyone should ride up on a bicycle and ask you, as my mother would say. Before you came along, I was this drip who couldn’t find words to express myself, particularly sentimental ones. That’s probably why I didn’t take to poetry, which now is #1.
My feelings about you, besides love, are anxious ones. Even though Daddy says you can get over things, that you must to go on, I will never get over thinking about you and hoping that you’re okay. Not a day goes by that I don’t wonder what you’re doing. Is your family well? Please, please write, Elisa.
Your friend forever, Stars,
Jessica
P.S. You never mention Wolfgang anymore. How come?
March 22, 1935
Dearest Jessica,
Thank you for the fudge, but I must tell you something about packages. I did not receive yours for a long while, which is why I said nothing, fearing it was lost. Then came a notification from customs that a box addressed to me contained a book and a paper forbidden entry to the Reich.
Dear friend, you must understand this is a time of reorganization in Germany and there are controls. Most books you would send would be censored as the Millay one was and a paper like the one about Teasdale too. Do not send your Sinclair Lewis either. Send nothing! I will not get it. It is best not to send me packages of any kind, and I will not send you any.
I must make this short.
Xxxx Elisa
P.S. You ask me always about Wolfgang Schwitter. You sound sometimes like Mutti worrying that I will never have a Verlobter. Even if he was here, I do not have time for boys.
April 19, 1935
Dearest Elisa,
Our letters crossed and I’m afraid I sent you some more books and fudge without knowing I wasn’t supposed to.
Have you moved to Berlin? Your last letter was just a note. I was so worried that I called the Schwitters to ask when Wolfgang and his father would be going there and have they plans to see you and your family? Mrs. Schwitter invited me to a spring vacation party she was giving for Dieter’s friends from Paris Arts & Science and Miss Thacker’s School for Girls. I actually enjoyed myself! It was then that she told me Mr. Schwitter and Wolfgang will perform soon in Berlin. They were in New York City making arrangements. She said they would probably see you at some point. Wolfgang wants to live in New York City when he returns and try his luck with theater.
I took Richard with me. He always claimed he did not like what he calls “big society parties,” but he behaved so well. When we were going home, he asked me if I really liked Dieter, as I seemed to, or if I was just being nice to him to remember you. I did really, really like him. He is not high hat or anything you would think a Schwitter could be. But I didn’t understand this remark of Richard’s.
