Chapter 6 ■ Refugees
Had Jakub and Otylia realized all the hardships that lay ahead, they might have stayed at home and tried to sit out the war with their families. But their youthful zeal kept them trudging forward that September day in 1939. My parents never seemed to look back, believing all the time that God would take care of them. It’s a waste of time to ponder what if, though it brings up issues of fate versus chance. It makes me think of twists my own life took as a result of their war years―all that they lost and had to forget. My mother writes:
Now there was no return, so we surged on. All around us, throngs of humanity—old and young alike—moved east towards the Russian border in an effort to get one jump ahead of the German tankers; hoping to reach an imaginary haven. We were very lucky indeed to have the buggy, and our old nag, Kuba, who became our most precious commodity. Along the road we picked up an editor of our local newspaper, just barely recovering from ulcer surgery, an older woman with two daughters, and two or three individuals who looked as if they couldn’t negotiate another step. There were now eleven of us on the small buggy.
Our poor brave Kuba pulled, strained, and sweated until we divided our little regiment and took turns walking. We went way into the night, stopping occasionally at a peasant’s hut, asking for a drink of water from the outdoor well and offering an inflated amount of money for a freshly baked loaf of bread, grabbing it before it was ready to come out of the earthen oven. At night we pulled over toward a grouping of roadside willows and, exhausted, fell into deep dreamless sleep, only to wake up with a start at the first rays of sun, to continue our arduous journey into the unknown…
Scores of fancy foreign cars and powerful motorcycles lay by the roadside, abandoned for lack of fuel, this surrealistic panorama attesting to the fickle insecurity of wealth. Still, tired and uncertain as we were, we couldn’t help but chuckle at the sight of some whom we passed. There were individuals pushing baby buggies heaped with personal belongings and men peddling bicycles whose rubber tires had fallen off, causing them to weave and twist on the uneven road. One ingenious character made time on a child-size skateboard. But what made us break into uncontrolled laughter was the sight of a local banker, dressed in a business suit, pushing a wheelbarrow in which his corpulent wife, a well-known and disliked snob, sat painfully aware of the glances and muffled giggles.
Together the couple fell in with the masses, looking for routes that might allow them to stay ahead of the Germans. I imagine seeing my parents’ hands clutched and entwined tight as they look back at the sharp curves of the Tatra Mountains, a glint of light dancing off a body of water, Krakow’s treetops painted yellow, hinting at fall around the corner. They telepathically question when and if they would see their beloved city again.
The First Lady of Underfashions is a nonfiction saga-like memoir written by Christina Erteszek and includes excerpts from her parents' unpublished memoirs. It is a complex, layered, and nuanced story that bridges the violence of war, the innovation of thought, the singularity of religion, the quest for identity, and the intrigues and intricacies of family life. Jan and Olga escape from World War II Europe and arrive in the US with just a few dollars. They turn their paltry savings into a multi-million-dollar fashion business. Olga becomes a leading patent holder of female lingerie, a trendsetter in the industry, and is widely known for her innovative business tactics. But as this husband-and-wife team think of retiring, they decide to merge with another fashion company, which proves to be a fatal move when a loophole in the agreement allows for a hostile takeover. This is also a story of a daughter's need to find herself. Along her path to self-discovery, she discovers her parents have many secrets, some of which will never be revealed.
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