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Illustration by Marley Allen-Ash
We met in an elevator. And by the time we’d reached the sixth floor, my family and I had an invite to dinner at Krysia Clarke’s apartment, her phone number and an invitation to call anytime.
Everything about her sparkled, from her lime green pantsuit studded with crystals, to her gold jewellery that twinkled in the elevator’s fluorescent light. Hers was the first invite we’d received from anyone since our flight from Africa landed at Edmonton’s airport on a frigid February night back in 1970.
We were greeted only by a Prairie snowstorm. Our sunlit house in Zambia, surrounded by desiccated grass and a lemon tree inhabited by a fluorescent chameleon, was a world away.
And there was no turning back. My dad’s two-year contract as a visiting professor in Lusaka had ended and, as an anti-communist fugitive, he couldn’t return to Poland. Canada would be our refuge.
The first few months were lonelier than anything I have ever experienced. Everything seemed to make me an oddball: my Polish accent mixed with elongated English vowels from colonial Zambia, my reflexive habit of curtsying to teachers. And our 12-storey apartment building on Whyte Avenue felt desolate. Neighbours were like ghosts: we heard clangs and footsteps in the hallways but rarely saw anyone.
The isolation made meeting Krysia feel like a small miracle. Our first dinner together was an oasis of joy. She chatted with inimitable ease and cooked up a storm – her bracelets jangling with every move. Each room she entered became brighter and strangers were friends she just hadn’t met.
Two years later Krysia moved to Vancouver and while she stayed in touch with Mom, I largely forgot her. Our friendship reignited decades later when my mother, by this time a fiercely independent widow, developed Alzheimer’s disease. My efforts to help her stay in her home proved futile. Her water bill once came to $700 as she left the outdoor tap running; she constantly gave away her credit card information; then, neighbours warned me that she invited total strangers to tea. When Mom graciously hosted one of Edmonton’s dangerous criminals, the police insisted I move her to a safe facility.
That was easier said than done. I was at my wit’s end.
That’s when Krysia called. She’d figured out what was happening with Mom. Her flight was already booked. She would stay for the month and help move her into a seniors’ home.
I waited at the airport and fretted. Would I recognize her again? But Krysia wasn’t someone you could miss. Heads turned as she walked out of the gate. She glittered with gold and her white hair matched her impeccably white, jewel-studded jeans.
The next day we started work: chores, like sorting mom’s kitchen drawers, were interspersed with making Krysia’s favourite recipes such as boozy mushrooms or mango chicken. Krysia and I worked, chatted and bit by bit she revealed her life story.
Krysia was one of the tens of thousands of Lebensborn children taken from their Polish families during the Second World War and interned in Nazi-run homes. Once the children were sufficiently Germanized they were sent out for adoption to mostly Waffen-SS member families.
Her misfortune was that she was a pretty five-year-old with platinum blonde hair – features that Nazi officials considered racially pure and superior. Like all the captured kids, Krysia’s value was determined by her body proportions, eye colour and skull shape. Children with birthmarks were considered of “low value” and sent to extermination camps or used as subjects in medical experiments.
One incident almost killed her. She was repeatedly hit over the head by one of her Nazi wardens to keep her from crying. Yet, she was one of the lucky ones. Only 15 to 20 per cent of children ever returned to their families. At the end of the war their files were destroyed so children’s ancestry became untraceable. But, thanks to the Allied forces, Krysia returned to her mother.
I still don’t understand how the bright, preternaturally cheerful person I knew could have had such beginnings. Hints of trauma only surfaced during thunderstorms when she quivered under a blanket. The thunder, she said, reminded her of cowering alone in the dark during captivity. Otherwise, she was a woman who knew how to overcome anything.
After her first return visit, my husband, two children and I couldn’t wait for Krysia’s annual trip to Edmonton. She cooked us beef bourguignon. There were always exciting activities for our young daughters, such as nail polish application lessons, followed by long evenings of adult-only conversation over sparkling wine. While my mom no longer recognized anyone, Krysia knew how to make her smile.
Krysia died almost 10 years ago. Her myriad gifts to us, such as a game of pick-up sticks we played together, costume jewellery, a lemon squeezer and a gourmet zester, are still among our treasured possessions. But she left far more than trinkets: her spirit of optimism, fortified by stories of survival, is deeply embedded in our family lore.
Over 50 years since that fateful meeting in the elevator, I face overwhelming grief over family health issues, and Krysia’s memory guides me through the toughest days. As if by osmosis, Krysia showed me how to cope. It didn’t take much to make her happy. Every evening she took out her notepad and set goals for the next day – with one frivolous activity to look forward to like shopping for iridescent nail polish. She found joy in the smallest things, such as picking a few wildflowers to adorn a lunch table setting.
These are not profound lessons, but then our guardian angel didn’t come on a beam of light with wings: she was just a small blonde lady who loved lime-green and sparkled with gold.
Agnieszka Matejko lives in Edmonton.