One of the
greatest gifts that my mom gave me was to encourage my creativity. I have vivid memories of the excitement of
receiving new boxes of crayons and coloring books when I was 4 years old. I also remember starting piano lessons at
that age and soon after discovering the joy of reading books.
I spent countless happy hours painting, reading and playing
the piano as I grew up. One of my
favorite first books was “Heidi” by Johanna Spyri which my mom read faithfully
to me every evening at bedtime. I loved
that story so much that I often dreamed of being that adventurous little girl
in the snow covered Alps.
When I
advanced from crayons to paints, mom would buy me paint-by-number oils. I must have been about 10 years old at the
time. One day, my mom bought me a blank
canvas and some paints and suggested that I create my own painting. Some of my first paintings were my rendition
of “Heidi’s Hut” perched in the snow covered Alps. I remember I painted several versions of it.
Our family
started downhill skiing when I was 12 years old and a new love affair was born
of flying on skis down snow covered slopes.
I have many happy memories of those years spent with my parents enjoying
winter together. Back then, the
Wisconsin ski hills were pretty primitive with only rope tows to get you to the
top and heavy wooden skis that didn’t release very well when you fell. The hills were not crowded since skiing
wasn’t all that popular yet and a rope tow ticket for the day cost 50 cents.
Some of the people that skied in those days were from Austria and Germany and
had grown up skiing in the mountains of Europe.
They were great skiers who became our good friends and taught me how to
ski.
I painted one
of my best versions of “Heidi’s Hut” at the age of 12. It was an ambitious attempt for me and quite
a large painting. Mom was always so proud of each of my paintings, sometimes
giving them away to her friends as gifts.
I never kept track of where my paintings went because I was only
interested in what I could paint next.
Fast forward
50 years where I am having dinner at my daughter’s home with my former
husband. He and I have been friends all
of our lives and we still are. He has been a
witness to many of the things I have painted even as a child. His elderly mom still lives in the
neighborhood where we grew up, and he is often there taking care of her. We were all dumbfounded that evening as he
told a story about a rummage sale the previous day near his mom’s home where he had seen one of my old paintings. The people
that held the sale apparently did not speak English very well. In fact they seemed to be German. He did understand that they wanted $30 for
the painting of “Heidi’s Hut” that I had painted over 50 years ago. He did not understand their explanation of
how it came to be there.
All of us
sat there in stunned silence wondering why he hadn’t bought it. I mean…what were the chances of him seeing a
painting that I did as a child, over 50 years later at a rummage
sale? It was a disappointing moment but
we didn’t say much, other than my son-in-law asked the name of the street where
the rummage sale had been.
Several days
later we were asked to come to our daughter’s home again because my son-in-law
had a surprise for me. With a big smile
on his face, he presented me with my painting of “Heidi’s Hut.” My dear son-in-law had taken the time to
locate the street where the rummage sale had been and knocked on doors until he
found the right one. And yes the
occupants did not speak English very well.
So he did not find out where the painting had been for 50 years. But they did make it very clear that he was
getting quite a bargain for $25 because so many people had been interested in
it.
As far as I
can guess, mom must have given it to one of our German skiing friends so many years ago. It really doesn’t matter. What does matter is that my son-in-law has a
heart of gold and knew that seeing it again would mean something to me. The painting of “Heidi’s Hut” now hangs
proudly in their home and makes me smile every time I see it.
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