Chapter Two: Everything Changes
December 10, 1933
Strange I don't feel like writing, but I feel I have no other friends or family to talk to so I will write. I can't believe what happened. My Mother died on the 30th. I can't…I don't understand. She caught scarlet fever I suppose. That is what the doctor said anyways. I knew my life was just to perfect. I can't believe she is gone. She's gone. I feel like it is my fault. She caught it from me I just know it. Louisa seems to have gone into a relapse. We buried her yesterday in the Noneburg Abbey graveyard. That was not fun at all. Father has tried to act like everything will be fine. He does not cry in front of us. I have heard him though. He sits in his study late at night and he stares at an old picture of Mother and cries. I only know this because I have been up late walking around crying myself. How am I supposed to survive without a Mother? I need a Mother desperately. What am I going to do? At least I still have Father.
December 25, 1933
Today is Christmas. It is the worse Christmas I have ever had. We were not allowed to sing or do anything that reminded Father of Mother. It stunk. I am practically trying to take care of Gretl on my own now. I am only twelve and I am caring for a child. Gretl reminds Father too much of Mother.
January 1, 1934
This is terrible. I do not want to write anymore. So long Journal.
May 20, 1938
Wow I have not written in forever. I think I have good reasons though. Even though I vowed never to write again I can't help it. Life is terrible. I am sixteen years old now. My last Birthday was supposed to be my sweet sixteen birthday. It was anything but sweet. Father left for Vienna to visit one of his girlfriends. I was stuck with my brothers and sisters and our governess for my birthday. Yes Father has been awful since Mother past away. He has not seemed to recover. My sisters and brothers barley remember Mother or what this house was like before she died. Father decided it would be best if we got a governess to look after us. For five years he has been pretending to be busy and going to random places around Europe. He is barley ever here anymore. When he is here he is not really "here". He runs this house as if he was on one of his ships. I never thought he could act like this. He keeps his distance from us. He doesn't even really talk to us anymore. He gave us these signals that he blows on his whistle to call us when he needs us. He can't even use our names anymore, just a whistle. He makes us march in a strait line down to him and stand strait up. It is terrible. Dinner is eaten in silence; we used to talk of such wonderful things. The worse thing is that we are not allowed to sing or laugh. He hates it when we laugh. If he catches us singing…well we don't sing because we fear he might throw us overboard off his ship. When he is gone the governesses are quite horrible. We have had ten of them this far. Each one is very old so they just can't connect with us. The governess home schools us now because Father says we should not leave the house. The only time we get to go outside is our annual dust walk in the garden before dinner. I am surprised he lets us walk out there. We used to spend so much time by the gazebo as a family. Now the gazebo is probably dusty. No one has used it for five years. Now I have no friends outside my brothers and sisters. The only person my age is this telegram boy named Rolfe. He is very cute. We have talked a few times and I can't wait until he comes again!
May 24, 1938
Father came back today from a month long stay in Vienna. It is strange when Mother was alive he hated that city and preferred Salzburg. Now he goes to it to visit a Baroness. Father really has not dated since Mother died, but now apparently he is. He still is not that happy though. I think he knows he will never find someone he loves more than Mother. It is impossible, but he stayed with her for a month? Now I am a little worried. I don't need a Mother or anyone for that matter. I am independent. I have argued with my Father about just not getting a governess for me, but he acts like I am eleven and tells me I need someone to watch me. I am not a child anymore…why doesn't he realize this? He needs to wake up and look at all of us. The children need someone to look after them, but they don't want some old governess when their Father could care for them. All we want is for him to give us some attention. We used to be his world and all that mattered. Now it seems like we are just kids who get in his way. That is why all of us children have resorted into playing awful tricks on our governesses. That is the only way Father will acknowledge that we are on the same planet as him. So far the ten governesses we had all left after awhile. These ladies were terribly easy to play tricks on. They would not even ever fight back. Not once. That's all I think we wanted to see was one fight back a little. But it did not happen. They would all just tell Father what disgusting children he had and told on us then told him they would have to leave. Father would look at the governess and not believe that his children would do something like that. So he would fire her for lying. I know he knew what we had done. I think he just liked the power of telling them to leave. He was never rude about it, but I could tell he enjoyed it. We hoped that Father would finally tell us we did not need a governess and I could look after them. I had almost raised Gretl after all. That is why we were so excited when Father told us tomorrow he wanted to talk to us at breakfast.
May 25, 1938
Ha! He told us at breakfast that we were going to have a new governess today and that he expected that we mind our manners. When is he ever going to learn? Louisa got a large smile on her face.
"Do you want to try to get this one to leave in record time?" Louisa asked once Father had left the room. We all nodded and left to start playing tricks. We made her room a total trap. We put spiders in her bed and put a bucket of water above the door. Then we got this small snake to put in her pocket. Then we had to meet our governess. After we announced our names she took the whistle and said
"The whistle is a good idea, I could never remember seven names." She said. Come on now is it that hard? All the governesses think the whistle is great. I would be caught off guard if one wanted to call us by our real names and get to know us. Every governess we have had has kept her distance from us. They don't even want to play with the younger children. Once Father had left we slipped a snake in her pocket. Well this governess screamed like no other. She ran strait to her room where the bucket of water fell on her. We all watched trying not to laugh. Then something happened we had not intended. She slipped on the wet floor sending her luggage flying all over the room. She was mad. So she decided to sleep I guess. So she pulled the covers and there was a whole bunch of spiders walking on her bed. She slammed the door.
"What do you think we should put on her seat at dinner?" Brigitta asked. Kurt thought for a moment and got a big smile on his face.
"I say we go to the stables and get some horse droppings." The girls looked disgusted, but agreed. So as we were waiting for dinner we brought some fresh horse droppings and sat them on the chair. Luckily Father had not entered the room yet, it smelled terrible. Father and the governess entered one after the other. Before Father figured out what the smell was the governess had already sat down. She got a disgusted look on her face. Then she looked down and screamed.
"Do you see what your pathetic children have done? They are an absolute disgrace to human society! I am leaving now!" She marched up grabbed her things and left. Fredrich looked at his pocket watch.
"One hour, fifty two minutes! We beat our time by an hour!" He cried in delight. We all smiled and looked at our Father. He shook his head at us.
"Children, I don't know what has come over you. You clean that up now and tomorrow I will send word to the abbey to ask for a governess. One who knows that discipline is the most important thing in children." Father left the room. Oh dear that did not go the way we wanted it to. Now we were going to get an old nun to come and discipline us? Oh this is terrible. Nuns are so…so…strict and old.