I had the honor of eating
dinner with Kurt this weekend. He is a 90-year-old Holocaust survivor, friend
of my grandparents-in-law and in love with my 3-year-old daughter. His eyes sparkle, his being glows with
vitality.
His step has a spring to it
and he moves easily with clear intention.
He takes care of my grandparents—who are just 3 years older—like a
parent taking care of a young child.
He pushed Ruth’s wheelchair to every meal following her recent heart
surgery. He waits on them at the
dinner table, bringing them each a plate of salad from the salad bar. He’s the first one up from the table
when dinner is done, hastily gathering everyone’s walkers.
He sat across the table from
my daughter and beamed at her through the entire meal. She frequently smiled at him and gave
him a thumbs-up. At that, Kurt
clapped his hands together in front of his heart, shook his head and
chuckled. He was smitten with
Clara. When there was a
possibility that my daughter might have dropped one of her many trinkets on the
floor from the dinner table, he was the first one over at her side—then down on
his knees—checking the floor.
“What
are we going to do about brunch tomorrow?” Ruth asked.
“Should
we meet at 12:00?” Kurt replied.
“I’m
not sure that I want to eat here,”
Ruth clarified. She looked at me
and said, “The eggs here are just so…so…taste-less.”
“Ah,
then how about pizza?” Kurt offered.
Both
Ruth and Burt lit up. Oh, yes,
they would love to have pizza. It became obvious that Ruth had been
hoping for such an offer since the moment she asked about brunch.
“I
know of a place just down the road,” he said. Kurt drives his own car—a large
Lincoln Town Car—and he takes Ruth and Burt out often.
I spent the remainder of
the meal getting to know Kurt better. I learned that he still travels and will be gone most of
April to New York and Florida. He
swims a half-hour every day and walks outdoors every day.
I also learned that he was
born in Germany near the Polish border in the early 1920’s. He moved to several different German
towns during his childhood, ending up in Berlin. He remembers school in Berlin.
“I got the last train out in 1939,” he told me. He had to leave his parents behind and never saw them
again. He ended up in Israel and
joined the army. He fought the
Germans across Europe from Italy to Holland. After the war, he was reunited with a cousin of his in
Ireland who had also fled Germany. 
Wow-would that we will be like that in our 90's. And how wonderful for Ruth and Burt, and for Clara. For him, this 'home' must be very, very good. Thanks, Susan.
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