"You would know the secret of death,
but how shall you find it unless
you seek it in the heart of life.
If you would behold the spirit of death
open your heart to the body of life,
for life and death are one
even as the river and the sea are one.
And what is it to cease breathing but to free the breath from its
restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek GOD unencumbered?
And only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.
And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance."
-Kahlil Gibran
Mom with her little Pride and Joys! Grandchildren Stefanie and Kurt.
After a long, 5 year battle with cancer, my mom, Ingrid Edeltrud Bauer,
passed away at 1:15a on December 17, 1998. Her smile, love, generosity
and courage will remain with us in our hearts and minds forever.
She is truly an Angel who is now watching over us.
Mom was born in Plauen, Germany on September 06, 1940. Her Father was a Doctor and surgeon, and her mother was an RN. When her father was recruited to do surgery on the eastern front during the World War II, the family moved to Warnsdorf, a town in the German Sudetengau - a territory in what was then Czechoslovakia - where they lived a harmonious life in their grandmother's house.
Her parents always said that the Germans living there never wanted Hitler to come in and "save them" since most people were getting along just fine.
At the end of the war, awaiting the return of her father from Russia - he had been captured by the Russians - their properties and belongings were confiscated and they were put into a concentration camp for eleven months. Thereafter they were flung into a cattle train with doors closed for three days with no water, food, nor sanitary facility. Finally they 'thrown out' in a small German town in the middle of winter with no place to go.
Picture of Mom, age 6, and Omi, my grandmother
Eventually they started a life in a health resort in East Germany where her father became the Chief Resident Doctor at a clinic for rheumatoid arthritis. The Russians kept everything scarce, so scarce in fact that her mother stole a Russian flag to sow skirts for Mom and her bestfriend.
Because of the teachings of Communism, her parents wanted Mom to be raised in an environment of Christian teaching. At thirteen, she was sent to the only Christian Boarding School in East Germany which made the pupils there automatically 'black sheep' in the public high schools. Living in the boarding school was Spartan and being separated from her mother so early pained her very much.
Because she was the daughter of the "intelligencia" she was not allowed to go and study at a university unless she first worked at a trade. She apprenticed for 2 ½ years as a seamstress, a skill which she had become perfect at. While it was her desire to become a fashion designer her parents would not allow her to study in Berlin because students in East Berlin - before the Wall was erected - had to go to West Berlin and agitate publicly against the "western regime". Instead she had to go to "Karl Marx City" where she earned a degree as a textile engineer.
In looking back on the hard times of her youth, Mom often marveled about the "psychology cult" in this country were everything gets analyzed and many things could be classified as a "non-event".
In 1956 she became a pen pal of her future husband Herb (Dad) in West Germany. They got go know each other through a chain letter where one is supposed to receive 256 picture post cards (4 to the power of 4). Instead she received just one card from Dad. Dad emigrated to the United States in 1958 and, after three years, invited Mom to come and visit him at his parents house while visiting Germany. The only intend was to meet an "old friend" for probably for the first and last time. Instead, when they met, they fell in love in about one hour.
Picture of Mom on her Wedding Day. About three months after their meeting the Berlin Wall was erected and East Germany was completely sealed off. They nevertheless became engaged the following year fully knowing that it might take five or ten years until they could be united. At that time, there was no possibility to leave East Germany legally. The only way was to either try to cross the heavily fortified borders and to get shot at or step on a land mine or find about $25,000 to get "channeled out" through a third country. Momd and Dad decided to petition to every level in the East Germany government, step by step, for the permission to get married and for Mom to leave. There was no law on the books to allow such a thing to happen. Friends and relatives thought that they might be 'nuts' because we didn't look at the reality of the cold war and what was happening. Especially since the communists did not even allow families to become reunited. Mom was blind to those "facts" and waged a war of petitions. Having been raised with
Communist dogma for 16 years - but believing no bit of it - she used the didactics of Communism of why they should allow her to leave. The petitions were turned down seven times. The eighth time, after almost giving up hope, the Interior Ministry in East Berlin granted an exception. This made Mom the first East German to be legally permitted to get married to a "Westerner" and leave the country. She emigrated to the U.S. in October 1963.
Because she had left legally, she now was also allowed to come back to visit her parents. This she did at least seventy to eighty times in the ensuing years.
Her outgoing and friendly manner is well known and cherished by her family, friends and relatives. If someone truly 'reached out and touched someone' it was Mom with her loving concern for others, helping whomever and wherever she could. Her warm smile was contagious to everyone she met. Never a complainer, she always put the interests of others ahead of her own, loving others. Faced with her own challenges she never minced many words and just would "get on with it". After she contracted colon cancer over 5 ½ years ago she would, for the longest time, insist that she drive herself to have chemo therapy or radiation therapy. We did not once hear words of fear or concern out of her mouth when she had to go for so many operations and procedures, never wanting to worry us.
She passed on to be reunited with God on December 17, 1998. A memorial service in her honor was held at the Cross of Christ Church in Babylon (576 Deer Park Avenue) on Saturday, January 16 at 11 AM.
Ingrid is survived by her husband Herbert, her children Elke and Kai with his wife Madeline, and her grand children Kurt and Stefanie.
One of her favorite sayings is by Og Mandino: "Treasure the love you receive above all. It will survive long after gold and good health have vanished".
