Danny and Family home again.
So far, the events in my story could be tied to a simple time frame: at Heerlen or at Cologne. But now, and for the next two years all would be at GK, and with the exception of a few major occurrences, it is now difficult to pinpoint dates even approximately. With that in mind, the next important thing would be the return of my family. This would be about the end of November '60.
The date was fixed: they would be flying back to Düsseldorf, arriving about midday. This should cause no problem. I knew the way there well enough, and I knew exactly how long the journey should take. I laid in a stock of food from the NAAFI, asked our batwoman (a refugee who'd crept overnight out of East Berlin) to make a nourishing stew to be left gently simmering in the oven for us when we got back, and took off.
The trip was completely routine: I'd planned it with half-an-hour in hand, and there were no holdups. But as I was leaving the outskirts of Düsseldorf for the airfield (five or six miles out), I saw to my horror a DC-3 approaching from the North, and knew instinctively that it was our plane. (You must remember that back in those days there were comparatively few civil air movements, all well spaced out).
And, now I come to think of it, there had been quite a strong north wind buffeting the car on the way, up at height it must have been a veritable jetstream up the DC-3's tail. It had landed nearly half an hour early. Then came an ecstatic reunion. When we got home, the stew was very welcome indeed.
We soon settled in. Christmas was upon us right away. I'd found a little supermarket in GK town which had a very nice Moselle at Dm 2 bottle, (with 10 pfennig back on the bottle). We cooled this on the outside ledge of the kitchen window (to save room in the fridge). The first snows had come now, and we towed Mary around on her sledge. We got her first Crib from Vroom & Dreesman (Heerlen): we have it still.
Goodnight, everybody,
Danny42C.
The more we are together, the happier we shall be.
Last edited by Danny42C; 4th Dec 2013 at 00:12.
Reason: Error.