Oma
    
    She had found a bit of woven, checkered cloth and fashioned it into a diaper for her newborn son. She scrounged some scraps of fabric, thread and stitched a flowered gown and an embroidered cap. With tenderness she dressed him and swaddled him in a worn woolen blanket to keep away the morning chill. She kissed his cheek one last time before laying him down on Brabant Street in Ghent in the early dawn on May 26, 1815.

     Cecile and Rosalie were returning to the common house near the port as they did every morning, holding hands, kindred spirits who had endured a night of brutality some men were inclined to heap upon those thought unworthy of any tenderness or care. Cecile lifted the swaddled infant from the street and held him close, her maternal feelings intact, untouched by the cruelty that visited her harsh life.   

     Oma, hiding in a nearby doorway to make sure no stray beast found him first, wept as the women walked away with her baby. Though they did not know the infant’s mother, this was a scene from a familiar play. Often they were compelled to perform the same role in a world that did not value them as though they were incapable of giving love and unworthy of receiving it. This early Spring morning they were no lowly Public Ledgers. They were survivors, women helping each other, sharing a deep understanding known only to them.

     Oma loved her baby. She promised herself someday she would find him, identify him by the clothing she had made and they would be together henceforth. She never did. She couldn’t. She lived a different life.

     Cecile and Rosalie took the baby to the police station.
 
     I have a copy of the entry into the police ledger on that day written in the stunted, fact-based style that persists in police reports to this day. 

     “Upon examining the child we found it to be of the male sex and appeared to be ten to twelve days old. No marks nor notes were found on him.” 

     Officer Francois Verheyghem drew up and signed a declaration for the court. With an “x” Cecile swore to the truth as she had done before for other mothers with impossible lives. 

     In the orphanage other women, nuns from the Franciscan Order, would keep the infant and rear him just as Oma knew they would when she could not. Jan-Baptiste was the rescued baby, the beloved son of my dearest great, great, great grandmother, Oma.

   Auntie

   “Wie ist dein Namen!”
  
   In a small voice, the trembling eight year old girl standing next to my strong, stoic Auntie, whispered, “Berthe.”
 
     Auntie was the Mother Superior of the orphanage in Ghent. Four nights before the terrified Jewish girl stood outside the convent doors delivered by the Belgian underground during the Occupation when the Gestapo was rounding up the Belgian Jews for extermination.

     Mother Superior met each child in secret. To minimize potential exposure that could compromise the mission, only she and a few priests knew of the plan to hide the children within the orphanage. 

      “Wat is je naam, liefje?”  Mother Superior asked.
 
     “Berthe”

     “Good. Keep your name. It sounds Flemish.” The plan was in play.

     Eventually the Gestapo caught on. Christian institutions were hiding Jewish children. The brutes arrived at the Convent door and barged in seeking the Jüdische Kinder hidden among the Christian orphans. “Wie ist dein Namen!”  Those with Hebrew names would be lost, most forever. This time Berthe was passed over. 

   In May of 1940 her peaceful life was transformed. Evil had come for her babies. Auntie fought the war in the moment as she could. Though she could not save all, she saved many. She vanished in 1942.

   I have two photos of my auntie from before the war. One she is standing next to the children all lined up by height in descending order. She is protective. No longer would they be alone or hungry. He would be pleased at how she had delivered His message of love.
   
  Elise.

    Gramma
     
    She prepared a plate of hot food, left-overs from the night before, pork roast Flemish style with boiled potatoes. She did not skimp on the Boetje’s coarse-ground mustard she was pleased to have found in the American market. She took the plate to the hungry man waiting in the enclosed back porch. It was a scene in the 1930s they both understood. He had recognized the “X” on the alley gate behind her humble home with the backyard vegetable garden and the marigold border along the sidewalk leading to the back door. Others before him signaled her generosity and compassion. They knew a stranger, a man alone, could frighten a small, unassuming woman so they waited politely on the porch, ate their meal in silence and gratitude before departing. She turned no one away. They were the least of His.  

     When he was a grown man my cousin, Corky, awoke to an illuminated Cross hovering over him. He told me God had sent it to him to comfort his broken heart. No woman would ever love him, he said. His mother had abandoned him long ago. In infancy he lived with his father in a filthy, basement apartment on the North side of Chicago. One day Gramma insisted on checking the welfare of her grandson over the protests of his drunk father. She found the baby lying on a maggot infested mattress. Unheeded cries left him in hopeless silence. She took him home with her. Though the balm of her love could not heal his primary wound, he found happiness in breeding canaries, delighting in their loving families, the mating, egg laying, warming hatchlings, feeding and nurturing until chicks were mature enough to take flight. He loved their beautiful songs. He lived with Gramma until she died. 

     I have one photo of them in their backyard garden. They are both smiling. Corky’s hands are shoved into his pockets in a perfect expression of teenage angst standing close to the woman who loved him until the end. 
    
    Marie

     All of my life these women have been with me, whispering to me, encouraging me, guiding me in times of uncertainty. 

     In 1995 Oma was there in the abandoned building near Jeffer’s Gardens where I found Carol and her baby boy. She was in the throes of addiction, when she handed him to me. I saw her maternal love, her courage and her grief. She trusted I would deliver him to someone who could care for him when she could not. On his behalf, I filed a petition with the court and swore to the truth with my signature. 

     Auntie appeared one afternoon in 1980 at Cedar Park Junior High when my foster son, a child refugee from Vietnam, hid behind me in fear as cruel classmates yelled at him “Gook! Go home!”  I told him he was perfect, he was mine and I loved him. In broken English I heard, “I ‘low’ you, ma.” 
 
    Just a couple weeks ago Gramma was with me. I was standing outside the Astoria Senior Center perusing the donation of fresh produce meant for members only. A homeless man arrived. He took an apple. In that moment his eyes caught mine. He wondered if I would snitch. I spoke Gramma’s words as she handed a hungry stranger his midday meal. “Make sure you take enough for later.”
 

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