(excerpt from ‘Braids’ in the short story collection The Other Place, published 2012, ©Regine
Haensel)
I wondered what we were going
to do about a Christmas tree. I knew we didn’t have money to buy one from the
place in town where they had the trees stacked up. In the Bradley’s garden
there were some evergreen trees, but I was sure they would notice if Papa cut
down one of those. Maybe we could cut a few branches and make a tree out of
that.
Then, after the Christmas
concert, Mrs. Knowles asked if I wanted to take our classroom tree home on the
last day before Christmas holidays. She said that it would just get thrown out
and someone might as well have the use of it for another week or two. When Papa
came to pick me up, he loaded the tree into the back of the truck. Mrs. Knowles
and I had already taken all of the decorations off and put them away. Mutti and
I had been making paper chains and other decorations at home to add to the few
special ornaments we’d brought from Germany, and the tree looked wonderful.
On December twenty-third Papa
went to town and brought home a parcel. Tante Dorothea had sent a nut cracker
and a big bag of nuts: hazelnuts, Brazil nuts, and walnuts, my favourite. Onkel
Hans had sent a box of marzipan. With the oranges and apples Papa had bought in
town, the pfefferkuchen cookies Mutti
had baked, we had Christmas plates almost like we used to have in Germany.
Mutti said the only thing missing was liqueur-filled chocolates, but I saw her
looking at Opa’s picture when she said it and I knew she missed him and all our
relatives and friends. There were only the three of us in Canada.
On Christmas Eve when we
opened the presents I found out that Opa had sent me the mottled yellow and
brown tortoise shell combs. I knew it as soon as I took the paper off and saw
the small worn box. I didn’t want to open it, but Papa and Mutti were sitting
right there watching me. In Germany it had been all right to have braids, but
in Canada things were different. I sighed.
Mutti came and sat beside me
as I lifted the lid of the box. The red velvet inside seemed worn to me, the
combs a little shabby. I picked them up.
“They were a present from her
grandmother,” Mutti said.
So old, I thought. My great
grandmother and my grandmother had both worn these combs. I rubbed a thumb over
one edge; it slid smoothly, the combs felt warm.
“Did Great Grandmother have
braids, too?”
“Yes, beautiful long braids
all her life.”
“And they both wore the combs.”
My fingers were still rubbing; the tortoise shell seemed to shine a little.
“Yes.”
“Did you ever wear them?”
“Yes, I wore them for my
confirmation and for special occasions.”
Mutti put my hair up with the
combs, in a coronet like Grandmother’s in the picture and I wore it that way
for the late supper we always had on Christmas Eve. I felt strange wearing
them, thinking of the women who had worn them before me. I peeked in the mirror
and was surprised how much like Grandmother I looked. It gave me a funny
feeling. I wondered why Mutti had cut her hair and when. My memories of her
were all with short hair.
With the presents from
Germany, the goose for supper, and the candles on the tree, I felt as if, for a
brief time, we were back there again. I knew, though, that just a few miles
away Susie and her brother were hanging up Christmas stockings. Tomorrow they
would eat turkey and cranberries and their tree would have electric lights instead
of candles.
Then Mutti started singing Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht in her high,
clear voice and even though I knew Susie’s family would sing Silent Night, I
couldn’t help but feel good. As Papa and I joined in on the carol that I
remembered so well, I thought of Opa, Tante Dorothea, Onkel Hans, my cousin
Willie, and Lotte. I noticed that Mutti’s eyes were very shiny and Papa had to
stop singing to blow his nose.
