Waltraut Lehmann - Shoreline, WA
November 9, 1989— I was at work, at my office in Seattle, Washington. For weeks now, my husband and I had watched and read, stunned, the developing stories from the GDR. I grew up in West Germany. I remember the day when my parents, my grandma and I were glued to our little black & white TV set as the Wall started to go up on August 13, 1961, 10 days before my birthday.
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In the late '60s and early '70s, I went on two study trips to Berlin. The Wall loomed large and gray and forbidding in my memories, as did the images of Peter Fechter bleeding to death. I was always convinced that the Wall would be there all my life, and that Germany would remain divided. Despite detente, I saw no realistic chance for reunification.
Even in October 1989 I could not allow myself to believe that the events were anything more than temporary turmoil, and that the protests would be crushed cruelly. And then, in November 1989, it felt as if the process was over before it truly began. The lightning speed with which the change occurred, the Wall was opened, made my head spin.
Yes, I was in my office, and I would like to think I got some work done, but I had a small radio, and I kept listening to the news and telephoning my husband in his office to find out what he had learned. It seemed too amazing to be true. I recall fearing that it was all some horrible hoax, that the events would be reversed, the border closed up again, tighter than ever.
The next day, November 10, a Friday, was dress-down day in our office, meaning we could wear blue jeans and casual shirts. I had a pleated wool skirt then, very elegant, and a fire-engine-red blouse (bought in Germany, as it happens), and I dressed up in those with lots of gold jewelry, and of course, many colleagues asked me why I was dressed up. I pointed out that I was wearing black-red-gold in honor of the event of the previous day. For weeks afterwards, I had to pinch myself to make sure I was awake and it was true.
Some years later, we took our teenage son to see Berlin, and when I walked through the Brandenburg Gate, I had to pinch myself again.
