---

IN THIS ISSUE

• Gerrit de Leeuw continues his story of his early life in Holland
• Elana Grueneberg has fond memories of her step-grandmother
• Jack Peaker sends the results of a radio station survey
• Don Henderson forwards an open letter to the Prime Minister
• Marilyn Magid describes one woman's answer to anger management
• Do only Ukrainians eat Ukrainian sausage?
• Rafiki's poem tells of a familiar problem with cleaning
• Tony Lewis describes one limitation of medical health insurance
• Bruce Galway suggests some snappy slogans for women
• Catherine Green, Charles King, and Jack Peaker suggest sites
• Have you subscribed to Heroic Stories yet? If not, why not?

Gerrit de Leeuw continues his account of his

CHILDHOOD MEMORIES

I remember the start of WWII with my dad standing me up on the armrest of his chair so I could look over the brick wall surrounding our second-floor balcony. I remember that after we heard a loud explosion, he pointed toward a south-east plume of smoke and said, "There goes the bridge." From stories I later heard, I associated this memory with the start of the invasion of Arnhem by the German forces.

The bridge referred to was the major north-south traffic bridge across the River Rhine. This bridge was rebuilt and again destroyed at the end of the war. It was later the location where the movie "Bridge Too Far" was filmed, a movie depicting the ferocious battle of Arnhem toward the end of the war. (http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Bridge_Too_Far)

This was the battle which later on Churchill referred to when he said: "If you ever meet a person who was in the battle of Arnhem, take off your hat and invite him for supper." (I can not vouch for the accuracy of the quote.) It was a battle which went horribly wrong. It was intended to end the war quickly but for several reasons did not succeed. The war carried on for almost another year.

There are a few recollections I have of the war years and the 'Battle of Arnhem' which we were in the middle of, from the September 17 - September 24, 1944. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Arnhem)

Our four-storey house was located on the south-west corner of a T intersection. Facing south was a narrow city road; beyond that there were about 10 railroad tracks with the railroad station being about one to two km to the east. The railroad station was often a target for bombings and later on, man-to-man fighting. Our location made us an ideal target for inaccurate bombings and stray ammunition. Another fact of war was that corner houses were, and still are, easy targets during cross firing of ammunition.

Just after the invasion, I remember German army trucks lining up parallel to the railroad and the soldiers coming into the store demanding the meager supplies that were available. I also remember my dad bitterly complaining about having to sell (maybe give?) his last supplies to the invaders and not being able to keep these items in stock for his regular customers. Customer loyalty and merchant loyalty towards their customers was a high priority in those years.

The most inhuman recollection I have is of a Jewish gentleman who lived a few houses down from our residence. As children we were always playing with rims of old bicycles, dried blown-up pig bladders for footballs, worn-out wooden shoes (were used as boats in the pond) and just about all the rudimentary toys we could think of. On his daily walks, this elderly gentleman always shared with us the little candy he could get. I distinctly remember him wearing the big 'star of David' required to be worn by all citizens of Jewish extraction for identification purpose. As children we just accepted this and did not question nor know its true meaning. I realize now that he was only too happy to share his last days with children who unconsciously gave so much of themselves.

The next thing I remember is, with other children, walking this gentleman to the railroad station, where I vaguely remember him entering a railroad freight or cattle car and waving to him. Sadly, again as children, we did not know the significance of this awful happening or why we went to see this gentleman off. It was only later in life that I put two and two together and realized what did go on. At the time, little did we realize that we were witness to one of the greatest atrocities committed against mankind.

All the hardships we as children or as a family went though during the war years were dwarfed by this instance. I am filled with emotion and my eyes fill with tears as I write this.

One of the fears during childhood I remember is passing an older mansion where it was rumored (I don't know or remember where we kids got this story) that people were tortured into confessions by the occupying forces. A widely belief of kids was that they pulled fingernails off peoples' hands. I know that we were always very scared of passing this house and always went across the street, not wanting to pass close to the entrance door. I remember being scared of the door being opened and a hand grabbing us and dragging us inside. I am sure it was the imagination of a child's mind, but to us it was a real fear at the time. Children, including myself, must have been witness to or heard stories talked about by adults that inspired this imagination.

To be continued.

CORRESPONDENCE

Elana Sheaf Grueneberg writes:

Just wanted to say thanks for the newsletter; I do enjoy it. The story by Gerrit De Leeuw reminds me of my grandmother, Bobby Ettie RIP. She was my mother's stepmother and she took on a family of seven children when their mother died just after the 1914 war. The two oldest girls left home and went to America - they did not welcome my grandma into their hearts. I recall her as a very gentle yet severe-looking woman, not given to too many words. She worked like a Trojan in the poultry shop my grandpa had and brought up the other children, and I cannot say she got any real thanks. I was named after her mother, and so she had a soft spot for me. She had diabetes and would let me give her the injections of insulin, and with the delight of a child, I would insert the needle into her upper thigh and shoot.

I cannot even remember if she spoke English; I barely remember how she looked. I do know that she was a small woman with steel-grey hair that sprang out of and around her head. She had sharp features and brown eyes and was very very thin. There is not a single photograph of her, and that makes me very sad. I also remember she was in and out of the hospital many times. She had one son of her own. She died when I was about 14 years old.

My Bobby Ettie will always be in my heart and mind, never forgotten until I die. I now know how dear she was to me and only wish I could tell her.

Every month Jack Peaker writes an article for the Guelph seniors' publication called The Sentinel. Here is his January article, which gives the results based on just under 2000 voters' responses, or just under 10,000 votes, the results of radio station AM 740's survey of "Your All-Time Forty Favourite Artists" conducted over a two-month period:

SENIOR'S TOP 40 ALL-TIME FAVOURITE ARTISTS

1. Frank Sinatra
2. Elvis Presley
3. Dean Martin
4. Nat King Cole
5. Glenn Miller
6. Beatles
7. Tony Bennett
8. Barbra Streisand
9. ABBA
10. Roy Orbison
11. Perry Como
12. Louis Armstrong
13. Andy Williams
14. Neil Diamond
15. Johnny Mathis
16. Doris Day
17. Bobby Darin
18. Ella Fitzgerald
19. Bing Crosby
20. Johnny Cash
21. Platters
22. Paul Anka
23. Gordon Lightfoot
24. Rosemary Clooney
25. Connie Francis
26. Anne Murray
27. Johnnie Ray
28. Carpenters
29. Patsy Cline
30. Buddy Holly
31. John McDermott
32. Bee Gees
33. John Denver
34. Ray Charles
35. Simon & Garfunkel
36. Engelbert Humperdinck
37. Beach Boys
38. Mills Brothers
39. Barry Manilow
40. Al Martino

I was confident that Frankie would come out on top, but there were a few surprises too. Number 9, ABBA, for example. I did not know this one, so I checked and found that Abba Karaoke, with vocalists Ann Wilson and Anthony Kiedis, recorded "I Lay All Your Love on Me" and "I Do I Do I Do". I wonder if any of your readers knew of them.

Don Henderson sends this open letter inspired by the passport requirement for foreign travel:

DEAR PRIME MINISTER

I'm in the process of renewing my passport, and still cannot believe this. How is it that Radio Shack has my address and telephone number and knows that I bought a TV Cable from them back in 1997, and yet the Federal Government is still asking me where I was born and on what date.

For crying out loud, do you guys do this by hand? My birth date you have on my social insurance card, on all the income tax forms I've filed for the past 30 years, my health insurance card, my driver's licence, on the last eight bloody passports I've had, on all those stupid customs declaration forms I've had to fill out before being allowed off the planes over the last 30 years, and all those insufferable census forms that are done at election times.

Would somebody please take note, once and for all, that my mother's name is Yvonne, my father's name is Frank, and I'd be absolutely astounded if that ever changed between now and when I die! Man!

I apologize, Minister. I'm really ticked off this morning. Between you and me, I've had enough! You send the application to my house, then you ask me for my freaking address.

What is going on? You have a gang of Neanderthals working there? Look at my damn picture. Do I look like Bin Laden? I don't want to dig up Yasser Araft, for crying out loud.

I just want to go and park my butt on a sandy beach.

Please would someone tell me why would you care whether I plan on visiting a farm in the next 15 days? If I ever got the urge to do something weird to a chicken or a goat, believe you me, I'd sure as hell not want to tell anyone!

Well, I have to go now, because I have to go to the other end of the city and get another bloody copy of my birth certificate, to the tune of $60!

Would it be so complicated to have all the services in the same spot to assist in the issuance of a new passport the same day? Nooooo, that'd be too easy! You'd rather have us running all over the place like chickens with our heads cut off, then find some bozo to confirm that it's really me on the stupid picture - you know, the one where we're not allowed to smile?

Hey, you know why we can't smile? We're ticked off!

Signed - An Irate Citizen

Marilyn Magid forwards this suggestion for

ANGER MANAGEMENT

Husband to wife: When I get mad at you, you never fight back. How do you control your anger?

Wife: I clean the toilet bowl.

Husband: How does that help?

Wife: I use your toothbrush.

UKRAINIAN SAUSAGE

A man goes into a store and tells the clerk, "I'd like some Ukrainian sausage."

The clerk looks at him and says, "Are you Ukrainian?"

The guy, clearly offended, says, "Well, yes I am. But let me ask you something. If I had asked for Italian sausage, would you ask me if I was Italian? Or if I had asked for German bratwurst, would you ask me if I was German? Or if I asked for a kosher hot dog, would you ask me if I was Jewish? Or if I had asked for a taco, would you ask if I was Mexican? Would ya, huh? Would ya?"

The clerk says, "Well, no."

"And if I asked for some Irish whiskey, would you ask if I was Irish?"

The clerk says, "Well, I probably wouldn't."

With deep self-righteous indignation, the guy says, "Well, all right then, why did you ask me if I'm Ukrainian just because I ask for Ukrainian sausage?"

The clerk replies, "Because you're at Home Hardware."

Rafiki sends this poem from a computer addict:

CLEANING POEM

I asked the Lord to tell me
Why my house is such a mess.
He asked if I´d been ´putering´,
And I had to answer "Yes."

He told me to get off my fanny
And tidy up the house.
And so I started cleaning up...
The smudges off my mouse.

I wiped and shined the topside.
That really did the trick.
I was just admiring my work...
I didn´t mean to ´click.´

But click I did, and oops, I found
A real absorbing site
That I got SO way into...
I was into it all night. <Sigh>

Nothing´s changed except my mouse.
It´s very, very shiny.
I guess my house will stay a mess,
While I sit here on my hiney.

Tony Lewis forwards this description in a nutshell:

MEDICARE HEALTH INSURANCE

The phone rings and the lady of the house answers, "Hello."

"Mrs. Ward, please."

"Speaking."

"Mrs. Ward, this is Doctor Jones at the Medical Testing Laboratory. When your doctor sent your husband's biopsy to the lab yesterday, a biopsy from another Mr. Ward arrived as well, and we are now uncertain which one is your husband's. Frankly, the results are either bad or terrible." "What do you mean?" Mrs. Ward asks nervously.

"Well, one of the specimens tested positive for Alzheimer's and the other one tested positive for AIDS. We can't tell which your husband's is."

"That's dreadful! Can't you do the test again?" questioned Mrs. Ward.

"Normally we can, but Medicare will only pay for these expensive tests one time."

"Well, what am I supposed to do now?"

"The people at Medicare recommend that you drop your husband off somewhere in the middle of town. If he finds his way home, don't sleep with him."

Bruce Galway sends these succinct

SLOGANS FOR WOMEN'S T-SHIRTS

1. So many men, so few who can afford me.

2. God made us sisters; Prozac made us friends.

3. If they don't have chocolate in heaven, I ain't going.

4. At my age, I've seen it all, done it all, heard it all ... I just can't remember it all.

5. My Mother Is a travel agent for guilt trips.

6. Princess, having had sufficient experience with princes, seeks frog.

7. Coffee, chocolate, men ... some things are just better rich.

8. Don't treat me any differently than you would the Queen.

9. If you want breakfast in bed, sleep in the kitchen.

10. Dinner is ready when the smoke alarm goes off.

11. It's hard to be nostalgic when you can't remember anything.

12. I'm out of estrogen - and I have a gun.

13. Guys have feelings too. But like ... who cares?

14. Next mood swing: six minutes.

15. I hate everybody ... and you're next.

16. And your point is ...?

17. I used to be schizophrenic, but we're OK now.

18. Warning: I have an attitude and I know how to use it.

19. Of course I don't look busy ... I did it right the first time.

20. Do NOT start with me. You will NOT win.

21. You have the right to remain silent, so please SHUT UP.

22. All stressed out and no one to choke.

23. I'm one of those bad things that happen to good people.

24. How can I miss you if you won't go away?

25. Sorry if I looked interested. I'm not.

26. If we are what we eat, I'm fast, cheap and easy.

27. Don't upset me! I'm running out of places to hide the bodies.

RECOMMENDED WEBSITES

Catherine Green forwards this URL of a site for ecologically-minded consumers:

Shortcut to: http://www.worldwatch.org/taxonomy/term/44

Charles King writes: I use a good spam filter, and you probably do the same. I have whitelisted you and that means that I will receive all the emails you send to me. If you don't have a spam filter, I can recommend SPAMfighter. It is a highly effective free spam filter for Outlook and Outlook Express. You can get the free SPAMfighter here: http://www.spamfighter.com/Pro

If you are concerned about climate change, check out this website sent by Jack Peaker:

http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/earlysigns/index.html

If you need an antidote to the daily deluge of stories of war and disaster, subscribe to

HEROIC STORIES

If you are losing faith in everyday heroism and acts of altruistic kindness; if you despair for our species and the future of the world, this weekly newsletter will reassure you that there are still heroes among us, humble though they may be. Join the almost 40,000 readers who are touched by these stories of everyday heroes. Subscriptions are free: http://www.HeroicStories.com

"One of the good elements of old age is that we no longer have to prove anything, to ourselves or to anyone else. We are what we are." - May Sarton