Traces of Heimweh

<P class=body style=MARGIN: auto 0in><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>In 1939 the pastoral calm of the German hamlet of Schladow in </SPAN></SPAN><?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags /><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>Poland</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> is shattered by murderous ethnic warfare and the full eruption of WWII. His civilian father uncle and many of the village's young men being brutally slaughtered by Polish soldiers for the offense of being German almost destroys the souls of young Edgar Bueschke his siblings their mother and grandparents but they adjust and regain a semblance of tranquility. Yet by 1944 troubles have escalated again and the Bueschke family decides to leave </SPAN></SPAN><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>Poland</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> for their ancestral </SPAN></SPAN><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>Germany</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> even as that nation plunges deeper into its own hell of Nazi atrocities. By 1948 the dream of a cohesive life in </SPAN></SPAN><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>Germany</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> has proven elusive and a fiercely loving protective mother resolves to emigrate with her children to </SPAN></SPAN><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>Canada</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> where other relatives have already gone instigating new and re-establishing old familial relationships.</SPAN></SPAN></P><P class=body style=MARGIN: auto 0in><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>For young Edgar his brother Ted and their sister Nelly the culture clash of the </SPAN></SPAN><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>New World</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> with the Old is explosive. In many situations such as at school they are made to feel more like interloping strangers than friendly newcomers even by peers who are only a few years past being immigrants themselves. Their mother gratefully accepting menial work to support her family enters into a marriage with an unloving deceitful manipulator who almost succeeds in stifling forever her hard-won independence. But with their move to the </SPAN></SPAN><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''>United States</SPAN></SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN class=apple-style-span><SPAN style=FONT-SIZE: 11.5pt; FONT-FAMILY: ''Times New Roman''> the Bueschke family's inner resources are reaffirmed and through their fierce unflagging work ethic and pure joy of being alive and together they prevail and achieve success and t