Chapter 22 of the P. and G. Klopp Story – Part I

June 25, 2016 / Peter Klopp / 3 Comments

From Darkness into Light

Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.’ Mature love says ‘I need you because I love you.’

Erich Fromm

Filing a Complaint

Beautiful Feldafing at Lake Starnberg – Photo Credit: bergfex.com

Soon after my return to Maxhof, Gauke and I received the order to report to the commanding officer. I wondered what could be so important that we would be sent away from our very first driving lesson in the New Year. The young clerk in uniform behind the massive office counter told us that the captain was expecting us in his office. With a heavy heart we entered. After the perfunctory military salute the captain asked us to take a seat. I had the ominous feeling that we might have unknowingly broken some rules resulting in a disciplinary issue that the sergeant at the driving school could not handle himself. Without giving any explanation the officer informed us that we would be transferred back to our unit in Koblenz as of April 1^st. We were stunned. But when the officer asked us whether we had any questions, Gauke inquired, “Why are we being sent back, if the purpose of the transfer was to have us trained as certified truck drivers?”

Villa Waldberta Feldafing – Photo Credit: wikipedia.org

The officer was a little taken aback, as soldiers are only allowed to ask questions, but not to question orders. But he must have realized that in this case we were entitled to know. For he said, “Soldiers that were transferred to my unit were supposed to be already fully trained as truck drivers. That was my request. Instead THEY send you! Dismissed!” From the furious tone of his voice, with which he pronounced ‘they’, it seemed to me that he was not angry at us, but at the system that cheated him out of two valuable truck drivers. Because of this ridiculous transfer I had not only lost out on the officer’s training program, but now I would also be deprived of the golden opportunity of getting my driver’s license. But what bothered my sense of justice the most was that we had been lied to, that the promise to provide driving lessons in January had been broken. In a violent outburst of angry words I released my frustration in a ten-page letter to Mother, which she acknowledged in a postcard expressing her hope that I had been able to calm down. In her motherly wisdom she had also destroyed the letter because of its incriminating content that she did not want anyone else to read.

Portrait of my mother – Erika Klopp

Gauke and I had a good talk over a mug of beer in one of the local pubs and discussed what our next move should be to address the unfairness of our transfers. I suggested grieving the matter at the next higher authority. Gauke agreed and encouraged me to write the letter of complaint, since with all my novel-writing I should have the better writing skills. Then we ordered another beer to drink to what sounded to us as a good decision. Within less than a week our grievance to the major in charge of the signal corps was in the mail.

Chapter 21 of the P. and G. Klopp Story – Part VI

June 10, 2016 / Peter Klopp / 2 Comments

Destruction of Ancient Carthage

A Metaphor for Emotional Turmoil

There was enough explosive emotional energy bottled up inside me. Having no one to write to, I had to return to the unfinished novella to release it. At the park bench near the German Corner in Koblenz I had most of its content on Carthage written up in my notebook. The personal experiences making the story come alive were missing though. Now they were burning with a searing fire in my heart. My fingers were itching to commit them to paper.

Ancient Carhtage - Image Credit: ancient.eu

Ancient Carthage – Image Credit: ancient.eu

Our driving lessons had unexpectedly ended. We were told that the instructor was needed elsewhere and we would start over together with the next batch of soldiers coming in to render the course more efficient. Gauke and I were delegated to work in the office. The assignment was to catalog the total electronic equipment with all its individual parts down to the last nut and bolt. Thus, we created a giant database for the signal corps stationed at Maxhof. I dictated the names and parts numbers and Gauke typed. One can hardly imagine anything more boring than this. But there was one advantage. We only worked during regular office hours, and we were done with our daily chores of number crunching by 4:30 p.m.

Peter playing with the neighbor’s dog (1963)

So I had more time than ever before to write in the semi-private room of our Maxhof residence. The historical sections of the novella heavily leaned on Mommsen’s historical work ‘History of Rome’ and to the best of my knowledge they described the power politics and Machiavellian schemes of Rome very accurately. My heart, which had lost two girlfriends within the span of less than six months, was the fertile breeding ground for the stuff that good writing feeds on. I transformed my former pen pal Margret, into Bersika, the daughter of a wealthy member of the Peace Party of Carthage to make the final dramatic encounter in the burning capital of the Carthaginians more believable. On the other hand, Claudia (Biene) and her twin brother received a more realistic description reflecting our first encounter at Lake Baldeney and the ensuing correspondence, which had ended so painfully. On the Palatine Hill in Rome Publius (Peter) and his friend became acquainted with an old sage, who introduced the young men to the philosophical center piece of the novel, which reflected my ideas, in part burrowed from Democritus, on God and His creation and how He lives within it in a mysterious interplay between mind and matter. The destruction of Carthage, the fierce house to house street fighting, the slaughter of tens of thousands of civilians, the senseless resistance of the dictatorial ruling party against the almighty Roman war machine, the burning houses, the stench of unburied corpses provided the background for the final scene symbolizing my chaotic troublesome state of mind.

Crest of the Signal Corps

When I had penned the last line, I felt an eerie calm come over me. For a while I sat at my desk without a thought, without a feeling; it seemed that my inner being had been poured out into the thick writing book before me. Private Gauke entered the room. He had been teasing me about my writing craze for the past couple of weeks and had noticed with genuine concern how I was withdrawing more and more into my crusty shell. He said, “Peter, it is about time that you get off your chair. I just discovered a cozy pub in Feldafing. Let’s go and have a drink of that great Bavarian beer.” Gauke was a fine fellow. I gladly came along. The novella was finished.

Fauquier’s Flower Paradise

June 6, 2016June 6, 2016 / Peter Klopp / 6 Comments

Photo Essay

Rose after the Rain

Tower of Margarita

Flowers of the Thimble Berry

Golden Banquet Table

Rare Tiger Lily

Fox Gloves among the Daisies

Precarious Foothold over Turbulent Creek

Precarious Foothold over Turbulent Waters

More Photos at Flickr (search for peterklopp42)

Chapter 21 of the P. and G. Klopp Story – Part IV

May 27, 2016May 27, 2016 / Peter Klopp / 12 Comments

One Misfortune Never Comes Alone

I was still reeling under the blow of the unexpected military transfer to Maxhof, Bavaria, when another one hit me like a bolt out of the blue. Biene wrote that she had met a young Dutch man by the name of Henk, to whom she was now engaged. They were dreaming about their own home at the edge of a forest near the city of Arnhem and were planning to get married. The news nearly tore me apart, all the more as Biene described our relationship as merely a nice correspondence between friends. Although my emotions were running high, I immediately responded to her letter and thanked her for being honest. It was a miracle of sort that I agreed to keep writing her. That promise was so terribly out of character, so contrary to what my pride and sense of honor would have allowed me to do that there was only one explanation. I was still in love with her.

Biene on Vacation at Lake Ammer 1963

Sleepless nights followed. I held endless conversations with myself. At times I would place the entire blame on my shoulders. Dieter was perhaps right, when he said that a kiss is more powerful than words, passion stronger than tender sentiments expressed merely in letters. Then the American folk song ‘On Top of Old Smokey’ was going through my mind during those agonizing hours of wakefulness. The apparent truth of the line ‘I lost my true lover for courting too slow’ hit me especially hard. Suddenly the pendulum swung into the opposite direction. For a short while, I found relief by putting the blame on Biene. ‘Surely, one does not get engaged overnight’, I argued. ‘Why didn’t she write me sooner? Why did she allow the correspondence to drag on so long? What about her other pen pals, the young man from Morocco for example? Does she want to keep all her options open? Is she like a bee, as her name implies, flying in a kind of romantic dance from flower to flower to see where she would find the sweetest nectar?’ Having experienced both ends of the emotional spectrum, I finally settled for a more balanced view. The wildly swinging pendulum was coming to rest in the middle. Concern for Biene pushed anger and jealousy aside; she might have responded to the lure of marital bliss too quickly. These internal monologues went on and on through several nights, at the end of which I was completely exhausted. But I had calmed down enough to finish my letter to Biene with the words, “Just one thing you must promise me. If you perceive a danger for your happiness in that you cannot distinguish between true friendship and love between a man and a woman or if your future husband does not like our correspondence, then have the courage to say goodbye. For I do not want to destroy your happiness.”

Frauenkirche, Munich, Bavaria – Photo Credit: wikipedia.org

With my Phillips tape recorder in one hand and a heavy suitcase in the other, train tickets and army papers in my wallet, I stepped on the Intercity train to Munich. Private Gauke, whose first name I no longer recall, accompanied me to our destination. We were both in uniform, as this was a requirement when traveling on official assignments. While the high-speed electric train was rushing toward the Bavarian capital, Gauke tried to cheer me up by pointing out all the advantages of the prestigious truck driver’s license later in civilian life. But he succeeded only partly in pulling me out of my morose taciturn shell. He did not yet know about the other problem, for which the possession of a driver’s license offered no solution. In Munich we had to catch a local train to Starnberg. Thousands of passengers were milling about the main station. At the crowded automated billboard announcing arrival and departure times I spotted the wrinkled face of my former scout leader, Günther von A. He was as surprised to see me, as I was to see him. What were the chances of this occurring? Once in a million or less. And what were the chances of still being in love with Biene? The question made me think about fate and destiny, a topic that philosophers and theologians great and small have been grappling with for centuries, a can of worms, which I decided in my present state of mind to leave unopened.

Chapter 21 of the P. and G. Klopp Story – Part III

May 13, 2016 / Peter Klopp / 2 Comments

Storm Clouds on the Horizon

In the meantime Biene had an exciting vacation with her family in Bavaria, often went paddling on Lake Ammer with her parents’ folding boat. She and her twin brother Walter almost drowned, when their boat capsized in a violent storm. They traveled to the German Alps and even took a gondola ride up to the Zugspitze, which is with an altitude of 3000 m the highest mountain in Germany. She returned home filled with wonderful memories. There was so much to tell, but the flow of letters began to ebb. The intervals between them began to widen into two-week gaps. Something must have happened that made me worry. Had my letters lost its fervor? Were the thoughts expressed too philosophical, self-centered, out of touch with reality? I could not tell.

Biene and her father on the Zugspitze 1963

Fall was a beautiful time in Koblenz. The park at the German Corner, located at the confluence the Rivers Moselle and Rhine, was ablaze with brilliant red, yellow and orange colors. There I often sat on a park bench alone away from the noisy inner city and read about the fall and utter destruction of Rome’s rival Carthage in Mommsen’s History of Rome. I was fascinated to discover that the cause of the three Punic wars was the same as of most other conflicts in the history of mankind, namely the desire for economic power and growth at the expense of some other country. I gained important insights into the ways in which imperialistic expansions were intertwined with a general decay of the moral fiber of a nation. I saw so many parallels in our modern world that I contemplated writing a novella on the mighty city on the North African shore, if I could only add and weave in some personal experiences to the story to make it more interesting. These experiences were coming my way faster than expected, and in the end I got more than I had bargained for. Indeed I would have preferred not to write the novella in exchange for the pleasant status quo.

Deutsches Eck in Koblenz, Germany – Photo Credit: wikipedia.org

I had just settled into the routine of orderly army life with its duties of monthly night watches, sessions of theoretical and practical instructions and the occasional maneuvers, which I enjoyed more and more, because they took place in the great outdoors away from the stuffy barracks in the city. Then a command from the newly formed signal corps at Maxhof in Bavaria went out to all army divisions to provide two truck drivers each. Our crafty commanding officer in Koblenz selected private Gauke and me for the transfer effective October 1^st, even though we had no driver’s license for those colossal Mercedes communications trucks. Obviously, he wanted to keep his precious truck drivers for himself. We were told that we would receive professional training and certification that could be very useful later on, when we returned to civilian life. However, it was immediately clear to my that with the transfer to Maxhof, I would lose out on the chance of becoming part of the upcoming officer’s training program. It would upon successful completion raise me to the rank of a lieutenant of the reserve with a much higher pay-out at the end of my two-year term. The wheels had been set in motion. I had no recourse to an appeal process. The decision was final. I was devastated.

Peter in a contemplative mood at home in Watzenborn-Steinberg

Chapter 21 of the P. and G. Klopp Story – Part II

May 6, 2016 / Peter Klopp / 6 Comments

To my dear blogging friends: Please note there will be only two posts next week. The one on Tuesday will continue with Anke Schubert’s submission in German: Eine ergreifende Liebesgeschichte, and the one on Thursday will be the next episode of the P.and G. Klopp Story. Canada is celebrating Victoria Day with one extra holiday for the month of May.

Discussion with a Friend on the Nature of Love

Mother had just returned from a visit to Gerry, daughter-in-law Martha and her one-year old grandson Wayne in Medicine Hat, Alberta. It so happened that I was on a ten-days leave and spent a relaxing vacation with her and Aunt Mieze, Aunt Lucie and Uncle Günther at their wonderful house in Watzenborn-Steinberg (Pohlheim). Mother talked a lot about her exciting trip to Canada. The proud grandmother had traveled with Gerry’s family over the Rocky Mountains all the way to beautiful British Columbia. Gerry described the countryside with its lush valleys, wild rushing streams, spectacular scenery and mild climate as God’s country. True to a long family tradition in the Kegler branch of the family, Mother wrote a report of her experiences of her journey to the land of the beavers.

Mother Erika Klopp with Gerry on her visit to Canada

Biene’s school holidays were approaching. In 1962 her family had spent their vacation on the Mediterranean island of Corsica. Now they were planning to spend a couple of weeks at Lake Ammer in Bavaria. Even though I felt my love for Biene was getting stronger with every passing week, I did not openly declare it to her, because I erroneously assumed that she would already know. When she once asked me if I had ever been in love, I missed the golden opportunity to reveal what was on my heart. Instead I used a ride on my brand-new bicycle as a metaphor to describe in the most abstruse way the chaotic state of my inner being. I described how I got lost in the woods. I did not know which way to choose to get out. I dug deep into my psyche, too deep for comfort. Not yet realizing that the good and the evil lie close together within each and every human being, I criticized the world for failing to give me directions. Blind as a bat to my own flaws and weaknesses, I declared the entire world with its political systems, the church, and the army rotten and corrupt. These pathetic meanderings of my mind did very little to express my true feelings for her and would have been better left unsaid.

Peter on his brand new bicycle

For the remaining three or four days I went on a bicycle tour with Dieter, my new army buddy. We traveled first up the River Moselle, then climbed up into the Eifel Mountains and stopped at a beautiful campsite named Pomerania, which reminded me of my grandparents’ lost home province in the east. At nightfall we sat in front of our tent looking at the rising moon in a cloudless sky. The day before I had bought a bottle of Moselle wine, a Riesling well-known for its distinguished qualities due to the grapes, which incredibly ripen more fully during extended periods of autumnal fog in the river valley. Gazing at the crescent of the rising moon I remarked, “If me girl-friend in Velbert also looked at the moon this very minute, our eyes would be fixed on the same heavenly object and in some esoteric way we would be connected with one another.”

Famous Moselle Valley with Germany’s finest Vineyards

Dieter chortled a few times, before he retorted, “But my friend, don’t be an idiot. That is not the same as being physically present. When I kiss my beloved Heidi, I know real love, love that you cannot even fathom with your strange romantic ideas in your head.” And that was the beginning of a long discussion on the nature of love. When we had savored the last drop of the wine and were ready to crawl into the tent, we had moved away from our opposite points of view and found some middle ground. We agreed that in order for a relationship to be meaningful both the physical and spiritual dimensions would have to be present. We learned something important from each other. As for me, I resolved to arrange a rendezvous with Biene at the first opportunity that would offer itself in the near future. But you never know to start with, how things turn out in the end.

The Peter and Gertrud Klopp Family

Reflections on Life, Family and Community

Peter Klopp

Chapter 22 of the P. and G. Klopp Story – Part I

From Darkness into Light

Filing a Complaint