Page 50 - My Story (final)

Toby in 1967

He became quite a little escape artist. On another afternoon I suddenly realised he was not in the
sand box where I had left him. I visited all the neighbours, but nobody had seen him. Then someone said,
“Oh maybe I saw him with Ernst, the farmer” and sure enough, Ernst came trundling up the street in his
tractor with Toby sitting next to him looking so pleased with himself!

Peter’s boss was a Siggy Kohn, a Czech refugee from the nazis who had lived in Ireland with his
very English wife, Marion and their three children, Julie and Ida, who were twins and their son, Andy, now
all grown. Marion was very welcoming and, as an ex-teacher took to our children immediately. She was
always hauling Toby off to her kitchen to bake cookies or scones while the girls were at school. The Kohns
lived in Bad Homburg, over the Saalburg. Ida worked in the Brother office as did her friend Gwenda from
Ireland.

Peter settled in to the new job, I was given a Brother sewing machine, far superior to the old
Jones. I bought toweling to make curtains for the bathroom, white with tiny little rosebuds on it. We
were so taken with the material I offered to make the girls Bermuda shorts and tunics from the same stuff
for the next summer and went back to the store and bought more material. Susan has this story that we
were so poor her mother ripped down the bathroom curtains to sew clothes for the children – not true.
But the outfits were a big success.

Dr. Wiegand had recommended that when we moved to Frankfurt, we take Hilary to the
University Eye Clinic to have her squint looked at. I did this, and the professor there said he could operate
and that, plus many weeks of 49exercises might straighten her eyes. She went in after a great deal of
crying as I left her. She then fought savagely as the nurses tried to undress her – after all, she did it herself
at home and nobody was going to do it for her in this strange place. She had the surgery and her eyes
were perfect (and always very beautiful, huge and blue with sweeping lashes). The surgeon himself was
amazed and we never needed to go back for exercises.

Gwenda and Ida often came to baby sit or to collect the children and drive them off somewhere
exciting, like the Frankfurt zoo, in Gwenda’s mini. Both girls had American soldier boyfriends and we got
used to seeing John and Jim about the place. They were also good at “finding” extra blankets, army issue,

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