Kinship and Kebabs.

Yesterday was another awesome day en famille! We went to Renee and Helmut’s house at midday and Renee brought out the pages she has written to begin the Ruminski Family History, as well as several small notebooks in which she wrote “novellas” when she was 14 years old and growing up in Argentina.

Eddy has told me dozens of stories about his family’s escape from Warsaw through Germany and England to Buenos Aires when he was a toddler, but in response to my requests for details he often says, “You will have to ask Renee about that…she’ll remember.”

And remember she does. She is 4 years older than Ed and vividly recalls her early life in the palace of the President of Poland, where she and her sister Wanda were born and where her father, Vladislaw, was a security official. She also remembers riding atop a wooden cart filled with their belongings, her father pushing the cart and her mother and sister trailing them as they fled through burned out buildings and chaotic streets, under the watch of Russian soldiers.

As she recollected her childhood, Helmut went through her parents' old documents and showed us the various birth certificates, refugee cards, passports and travel papers the family used to emigrate to Argentina in 1947, where they lived until Eddy was 17 years old. The facts are grim, but the arc of the story is inspiring. The courage and unity that characterize the Ruminski family odyssey is worth sharing and writing about. We all hope Renee will find time to use her memories, and her considerable talent for storytelling, to finish her book.

In the late afternoon we all moved to Renee and Helmut’s daughter’s house for dinner. Arlene has a small stable outside of Knoxville, where she rides her hunter jumper, Chester, boards horses, and teaches riding to children. Two of her students and their parents who recently moved here from California, as well as her fella, Lee, joined us for dinner after a tour of the stable and farm.

Eddy began dinner with champagne and a heart-felt toast to family before we dug into platters of kebabs, salads and roasted potatoes. We celebrated Lee’s birthday with numerous desserts and by singing to him in German, Polish, Spanish and Farsi. A Tennessee native, he reciprocated by leading us off in a rousing rendition of “Rocky Top, Tennessee”. It was a joy-filled celebration and we all went home feeling warm and connected.

I imagine that for Helmut, Renee and Ed, it must be gratifying to see their daughter and niece pursuing her dream, sharing her gifts, and carrying on the legacy of Ruminski courage, determination and love of life.