How German Is It

by Walter Abish

  On Saturday and Sunday my father likes to stay in bed for hours. Today I am planning a new city in bed, he will say. He doesn’t like to be disturbed when he is thinking. Go away, I am thinking, he will say. He once told me not to believe everything people told me. But my mother said: Don’t let him confuse you. I have three best friends. Each of them believes that she is my very best friend. Each one calls me her best friend. I asked my father what I should do. He shrugged his shoulders and said that no one needs three best friends and that I should narrow it down to one. Three of anything is too demanding. My mother said that things would work out by themselves. That without doing anything, I would end up with one friend, and that it would be the friend I would really want in my heart of hearts. I would like it to be Erika. In my heart of hearts I would like it to be Erika, but it may not be possible. It could be one of the other two. It depends. When I was your age, my mother told me, I was happy to have one good friend … I have heard the mayor call my father his best friend. That is how he introduced him to some people at a large dinner here in Brumholdstein. And this is Helmuth, the brilliant architect, my best friend, and this here is Gisela, his daughter and the best friend of my daughter Erika. My father looked at me warningly. He was afraid that I would say that Erika was only one of my three best friends. The mayor did not mention my mother or Magnus. My brother, Magnus, doesn’t like his best friend. And you … You are his brother so you can’t be his best friend. You can only be his best brother. And then she laughed uncontrollably.

  At school in Würtenburg all my classmates know that my father is the famous architect. Once, said Gisela, we all went to look at the police station he had built. They served us chocolate milk. Another time we went to the post office, where they served us egg salad sandwiches and milk. But the bread was stale. Then the terrorists blew up the post office, and a few children in my class said that it was because someone didn’t like my father’s design. When I told this to our teacher, she said to the entire class that we should be proud to have an architect like my father who had been born in Würtenburg.

  When I asked my father why he had moved to Brumholdstein without us and without my mother, he said that basically everything that can happen on TV can also happen to real people. He said that life resembles a soap opera. He said that people had a curious habit of copying what they see on TV. I mentioned that in class in Brumholdstein and my teacher, Miss Heller, said that my father had a very vivid way of expressing himself.

  When my mother asked me on the phone how I liked being in Brumholdstein, I said that I liked living in a house that had so few doors. You mean there’s no door to your room? And then I had to laugh and laugh. I think she was angry. And when I said I liked it over here, she became even more angry.

  Reaching the Geigenheimer Strasse, Ulrich suggested that they stop at the Karl-Mainz bakery and select something to eat. Unless you’d rather have cake and chocolate at the Pflaume? Oh yes, I’d rather, she said enthusiastically. I was hoping that you’d take me to the Pflaume. Then she mentioned how she had run to tell her father that she had seen Egon and his wife, Gisela, on the cover of the magazine Treue. He told me that I could buy an issue later that afternoon, but I was afraid that they would be sold out. Just then my mother called him from Würtenburg to tell him that Egon and Gisela were on the front cover of Treue. I had to laugh. You wouldn’t think that Egon’s wife, Gisela, spends half her time crouching in a corner, said my father. Anyhow, he told her that he already knew. Then he gave me money to buy three copies at the newsstand. One for myself, one for him, and one for Erika. At the kiosk the man said that wasn’t it funny because I was the second person in the last half hour to buy three copies. Who was the other one, I asked, and he said it was Franz, the waiter at the Pflaume. I told my father, and he said: Just as I expected. The next day Miss Heller said in class that the house on the cover, the beautiful house in the background of the latest issue of Treue, was designed by none other than Helmuth Hargenau, the father of Gisela Hargenau. Then, when Erika asked me if I was proud of my father, I said: No. Not particularly. He was my father, that’s all. And Erika got angry and wouldn’t speak to me the rest of the day. When I was asked if I was named after Gisela who was on the cover of Treue, I said yes. I said that she was our dearest friend and that my mother had named me Gisela after her, although I knew it wasn’t true.

  I hope that Franz is not here, she said as they entered the Pflaume.

  Why not?

  Because he toadies to my father and to the mayor.

  You don’t believe that, do you?

  My father says so.

  Well, said Ulrich, when they entered the restaurant. Looks like you’re out of luck.

  Franz spotted them at once and came hurrying over to greet them.

  Once they were seated, Ulrich said to Franz: We have come to seek your advice. Should we select the walnut cake or the Weintrauben-schnitten or the Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte or the chocolate cake?

  When Franz left with their order, Gisela said: Isn’t he creepy.

  A beautiful summer day. He had nothing planned. He could, he supposed, rent a car and drive to the mountains. Gisela was alertly watching the movement of all the waiters, following each of them and their trays to their destination. She spotted her ice cream and cake on Franz’s tray from afar. Not concealing her dislike of Franz, she examined the dish of ice cream set in front of her carefully before tasting it.

  Do you know what you will be doing later this afternoon? Ulrich asked her.

  Oh yes.

  What?

  I don’t know yet.

  He had no reason to distrust his brother, or the mayor, or Franz, or Gisela, or Anna, or Brumholdstein, or the reason why he was staying where he was and not in his brother’s house. On a summer’s day like this, when everyone was filled with a pleasant inertia, nothing could possibly arouse one’s mistrust in the institutions or motives of people in general, although the motives of people and the motives of institutions, inasmuch as institutions can be said to have motives, should not be taken at face value. But why complain as long as the service was friendly, the rooms comfortable, the linen clean, the food edible, the people polite, the brother cordial, the mayor friendly, Anna seductive.

  Yet, there are people with an inbred, all-encompassing mistrust of everything and everyone. Franz was a case in point. But perhaps, in Franz’s case, there was a certain justification. At any rate, one would expect a waiter who daily waited on people like the mayor and Helmuth to show a certain mistrust, a certain skepticism, if only as a defense against the unexpected assault, the unexpected complaint, the unexpected betrayal.

  Yet, and this may appear astonishing, the day the magazine Treue appeared on the newsstands with the cover story on Egon and Gisela, Egon’s beautiful wife, Franz at the first opportunity rushed out to the nearest kiosk to buy three copies: one for himself, one for his mother, now living in Schweinfurt, and one for his younger brother in Buenos Aires. After all, these people on the cover were friends of the mayor and of Helmuth von Hargenau. Franz had waited on them in the Pflaume. The moment he caught sight of the attractive cover, with Egon and his wife standing next to their white Mercedes and the villa designed by Helmuth in the background, he decided that he would have it framed for his workspace in the basement. It is hard to say how these ideas suddenly take shape. His only encounters with Egon had been at the Pflaume. Generally Egon was in the company of the mayor and his wife, Vin, and Helmuth. As a rule Egon was the one to pick up the check. Once or twice the mayor had told Franz to put it on his account: which is to say, to put it on the city’s account.

  After Franz framed the cover of Treue and hung it on the brick wall in the basement, Doris had said: Now don’t they make a splendid-looking couple. He had grunted in agreement, not quite certain whether she was mocking him, or them. What she failed to do, was to ask him, as she might have several years ago, why he, a Marxist, well … anyhow, a man who toyed with Marxism, would want to hang on his wall the
colored reproduction of two thoroughly spoiled rich people to whom his own usefulness was strictly limited as a waiter, someone who unobtrusively served them while listening to their pleasant banter.

  What else did Doris refrain from doing?

  For some time she had not taken the bus to Brumholdstein for her usual shopping spree. After all, why go to Brumholdstein when they had perfectly good stores in Daemling? They also had two movie houses, one of which doubled as a theater. They had a public library, a dance hall, a night club, a dozen or so bars, and even a place where one could roller skate. So why visit the antiseptic if somewhat more opulent world of Brumholdstein? Merely to look at the over-priced objects in the store windows? Or at the former city people who had moved there because Brumholdstein was only thirty minutes from the mountains and twenty-five minutes to the lakes?

  Initially when Franz started at the Pflaume, people envied him, because they still chose to regard Brumholdstein with all kinds of expectations. It meant jobs. It meant money. At that time hardly anyone expected the sudden influx of Greeks, Turks, Yugoslavs, Italians, and even Arabs who flocked to Daemling in order to work in Brumholdstein, to provide the menial services the Germans were reluctant to provide. And then, before anyone could count to ten, the foreigners had occupied an entire section of Daemling. A district of their own. Walking through their quarter was like taking a stroll in a gigantic, albeit somewhat squalid, bazaar in some Middle Eastern country. A place where people spoke at the top of their lungs, where people sat on the stoops sipping coffee, where people gesticulated wildly everytime they said the simplest thing, not to mention the unbelievable odor that hung over the street, a sweet sickly smell …

  Franz pretended not to have heard when Doris one day, out of the blue, said: I’ve lost all desire to stay in Daemling. I think we should accept your brother’s invitation and move to Buenos Aires. We would still be among Germans. You can always get a job in a German restaurant. Or if you’d rather, I can accept my uncle’s offer and borrow money with which we could open a tiny restaurant in a nice section of Bavaria, or even Austria. I’ve spent enough time in Daemling. I deserve something better.

  Of course you do, he agreed. Why don’t you take the bus to Brumholdstein today and go to a movie?

  Not a movie, she screamed … Something better.

  Well, he said with great dignity, if you feel you must scream there is no point in talking about it.

  Do you understand what I am saying? I would like something better.

  Not that Franz had not tried. He was working in the best restaurant. He was meeting the people who wielded power. Yes, he knew them by name. They responded to his greetings. They knew him by name. If he had a problem, all he had to do was to mention it to the mayor, or to Helmuth von Hargenau.

  The only way I can retain my self-respect and my dignity is if I am a peer of the people I see daily. I am their equal, do you understand, he said to Doris. I may be a waiter. But I am a waiter at the Pflaume. They respect me. They trust me. Furthermore, I am functioning in a world I understand. I don’t owe anyone any favors or any money. I couldn’t start again in Argentina with the assistance of my younger brother. Do you really see him as my advisor? Never. Will he speak up for me, protect me, defend me, help me to succeed? Never. As for your uncle. He is only offering you the money because he knows that I would never accept. He is offering you the money in order to demean me. In order to triumph over me. In order to show the extent of his wealth. To inform me at the first opportunity: Look, where would you be without my assistance. No sir. I would rather borrow from a bank. What we can do, once we save a little more money, is buy a car … yes, that would give us a certain mobility …

  Franz had been married once before. Once, briefly in Hamburg to a dancer. Well, they called them entertainers. The term covered a multitude of sins. Doris did not even know her name or what she looked like. If Franz still had a photograph of his first wife he kept it well hidden. Clearly, if Obbie in any way resembled his mother, there was good reason to keep the photograph hidden. However, Doris suspected that Obbie’s grotesque appearance was more likely the result of his having been shunted back and forth as a child, unloved and unwanted. At present, according to Franz, Obbie was working as a painter’s assistant. No one knew where Obbie’s mother was or if she was still alive. When Obbie was still a child, living with Franz’s mother, Franz would write an occasional letter to her, enclosing a few hundred marks. The letters were always the same. How is Obbie? Tell him to study hard. Tell him not to respect authority. His mother’s reply, short and to the point, would raise an angry flush on his face: It’s time that you and Doris took Obbie off my hands. I am tired. I am old. I need my rest. The boy will never come to anything. He resembles you.

  Although Doris would not have objected, Franz refused even to contemplate having Obbie stay in their house, because Obbie served as a reminder of his stay in Hamburg with a woman who was a whore. And wasn’t Obbie her son? Nevertheless, despite his rejection of Obbie, he kept supporting him. After all, merely detesting something was not sufficient cause to abandon it. Didn’t he detest his boss, the owner of the restaurant, and most of the people who ate there, and the pretentious menu and the overpriced wines and the affectations of the diners, and the bloody ride on the bus each night, and the passengers, although for some inexplicable reason he remained quite fond of the driver.

  Tell me, Franz, Doris had once asked him. What do you like?

  Why? He stared at her belligerently. I like a lot of things?

  Namely?

  What’s it to you?

  Name one. One single thing.

  I like the summer. Life is more pleasant in the summer?

  Are you sure of that, she asked ironically.

  Ulrich’s niece, Gisela, is ten. Soon she will be eleven. She had a way of staring at Franz that he must have found disconcerting.

  Stop it, Gisela, Ulrich said to her.

  Stop what. She looked at her uncle, all innocence. What have I been doing?

  It’s not nice, he replied.

  He toadies, she said viciously. He toadies to you, to everyone.

  It’s his job, explained Ulrich, trying to sound reasonable. Waiters frequently toady. They want to get tips. They want to please. Didn’t you like the cake?

  When they were walking back to Helmuth’s office Gisela remembered that when her father saw the magazine with the article on his friends, Egon and Gisela, he said: Oh, what pure unadulterated shit. She was not sure if her father had meant the article was shit or if the words were aimed at his friends. Was he blaming them for being on the cover?

  That reminds me, said Ulrich. I still haven’t seen that particular issue.

  .

  14

  Anna Heller wrote in large block letters the word “familiar” on the blackboard, and then turned to face the class. What do we mean when we use that word, she asked. What is familiar? Twenty more or less expressionless faces gazed at her. Clearly, she said, for us sitting here right now, it is this interior, this classroom, and this new schoolhouse as well as this street below, which is visible to us from the windows on our right. What else is familiar? Well, our respective desks and the way they are arranged, and the view of the playground from the windows at our rear, and when we leave this classroom, the view of the long corridor with the wide staircase and one flight down to the left the door to the principal’s office. That is very familiar. General laughter. But, if we think of it, isn’t this piece of chalk in my hand also familiar? It is not the piece I held in my hand this morning. It is a fresh piece. But unless we were to examine it closely, we could not tell if it is the one I used this morning or not. No, that’s not even true. No matter how closely we examined this piece of chalk, we would only be left with something that is familiar. What is familiar, then, is not this particular piece of chalk but the act of holding it, of using it. Now the street below is, as I have already pointed out, familiar, but it is not the same street we saw yesterday or the street
we will see tomorrow. It is always changing, only most of the time we pay no attention to the changes. In fact we remain unaware of them. Why should we, after all, keep track of the traffic flow or remember where all the stores are located. In passing, the buildings, the traffic lights, the traffic policeman at the corner, and for those of you who live in Daemling, the schoolbus waiting to take you back to your homes, are absolutely familiar: day-to-day occurrences. We are not surprised by them. One might even venture to say that the familiar is reassuring. We more or less know what to expect. What it will be like. It will be familiar. Which may be a good reason why we, every once in a while, wish to get away, to escape from the familiar, to visit some far-off place, China or India for instance, because we are willing … no … because we are eager to stretch our imaginations and see something for the first time, something that is not yet entirely familiar. And so, if we are open-minded, we want to introduce to our existence something that is new, something that is different. We want to taste unfamiliar foods. Mind you, it’s only once in a while. We want to listen to people speak a foreign language and for a time sleep in unfamiliar surroundings in an unfamiliar—but hopefully comfortable—bed. More laughter at this. We want to visit museums and monuments and ruins that we only know from reproductions in books. Having seen the photographs of what we have come to visit, we naturally know what to expect. So the ruins, the works of art, the foreign cities are not entirely unfamiliar. And then, in no time, we discover that the longer we stay in one place, the longer we sleep in unfamiliar beds, the longer we meet people from other countries, the more familiar it all becomes. How long can something remain unfamiliar? And, perhaps an even more important question is, does the unfamiliar activate and spark our curiosity and interest? Is it a call to us to explore and familiarize ourselves with the unknown?