On the way to Goslar – All photos by Al Bolter
A Train Ride to Goslar, a Train Ride to Change…
The loudspeaker blared, “Goslar, hier Goslar” as my feet sprung from the train and smacked down upon the railway platform on a trip to this designated UNESCO World Heritage German town this June. In an instant, the old stone rail station that lies at the end of the platform came into view; in an instant, memories flooded back from a time almost 30 years ago, when I first made the trek to this bastion of medieval glory, this bastion of so many fond memories.
Change stops for no one, but as I absorbed my surroundings, for a moment I thought it might have. The wooden “Willkommen” sign in Germanic script still hung from the rafters of the platform roof, and off in the distance the antennae tower still stood atop the Steinberg Mountain as it peeked out over the Altstadt (old town) that Goslar is. A moment of comfort embraced me, even though I realized that things weren’t once as they seemed, but that they had indeed changed.
Goslar Train Station
It was here, in the summer of 1986, that I would cross paths with a stranger that would leave an indelible mark upon me, a mark that taught much about the meaning of friendship (see Friendship and a Birthday in Berlin…). It was here that this stranger would become a family friend, and practically an aunt to me. It was here that this stranger would introduce me to wonderful people from all walks of life. It was here that many an evening would be spent around this stranger’s dinner table with family and friends. It was here that this stranger and I would traverse the town square with dogs Charley and Goetz in tow. And it was here, in 2004, that I would return to visit this stranger’s gravestone after her passing in May of that year.
Goslar Town Square
More than 10 years had come and gone since that somber visit, and it was with trepidation that I once again set out to find her marker of time, her marker of a life lived. Searching in vain upon the rows of monuments, I happened upon a groundskeeper, who, as life’s randomness would have it, knew the family.
“Of course,” she said. “We lived not far from the family. I’ll never forget the time her husband appeared at the door with their dog Charley carrying a rose in its mouth as a tribute to our dog that had just died.”
“Wow,” I thought, somewhat taken aback, as I recalled the story told to me by the family years earlier. And here I was now talking to the person it had happened to!
“Their house was sold and the lot subdivided with new houses built around the old one,” she went on to explain.
The author’s parents visiting Goslar in the 1990’s with the “stranger” in the middle and Charley saying hello…
The gorgeous yard with goldfish in the willow-covered pond was no more, or at least not the way I remembered. And as nice as the surrounding new houses looked, my mind struggled to accept the change that had happened. But perhaps that’s not such a bad thing, as some memories are just best left untouched.
Change had come to Goslar, just as change comes to us all…
For more, check out The C.A.T. Principle: Change, Action, Trust – Words to Live By, a Global Ebook Awards GOLD Winner for Best Self-Help Non-Fiction Ebook of 2014, available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. See the latest Amazon reviews here. Now revised and expanded, and once again nominated for the Best Self-Help Non-Fiction Ebook of the 2015 Global Ebook Awards!
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A 2014 Global Ebook Awards GOLD Winner for Best Non-fiction Self-help Ebook.
2015 Global Ebook Awards Nominee for Best Self-Help Non-Fiction Ebook