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Helmut is a name that makes me smile – it reminds me of metal, of a sturdy armour, a helmet. Helm in German, and mut like courage, heart, spirit. The more I go back in time, the more vividly I see it.
Like the meaning of his middle name, my Opa smelled of the scent that stains fingers rubbing brass, that and fresh eucalyptus, most likely because of a habit of carrying Ricola sweets around wherever he went. A packet of these treats, usually dark green or lavender lilac, could last a trip to the neighbourhood’s pharmacy (to stock up on them, and maybe on some gummy vitamins too) or all the way to the Sierra de Madrid. We’d go there in summer for a hike and a picnic, and in winter, because a one-and-a-half-hour drive was worth Marcelino’s veal sandwich. Always surrounded by snow, always in the middle of a fire.
Other popular winter treats were Reisens and Werther’s Originals, which Matt has just told me, are the treats “in every grandma’s bag.” Only in my case, they were “in every one of my Opa’s back pockets.” Specially Werther’s were a treat to have in silence, six-year-old me feeling Opa’s slightly itchy jumper on my cheek as we heard each other savour the caramel of a such a comforting treat.
Above all, he was a fan of Ritter Sport chocolate. Extraordinary, how neatly he broke the squares apart, the more hazelnut the better, and bit on them slowly as he let the chocolate melt in his mouth. One could almost hear the reluctance with which he had let it go, his face moving with the memory of the chocolate.
Baldur Helmut Oberhauser was a man of many noises and sounds. He sang Edelweiss when he wanted to remember German greens and greys, and played Reinhard May on the guitar when he needed us to fall asleep at night. He tutted slowly, a soft indication that he didn’t approve, and whistled with relaxed lips, both traits that I made mine when I grew older. He had traditions, such as the gifting of that cone made of cardboard and cloth filled with chocolates and sweets to the brim, on our first day of primary school. We, together, had eras.
There was the era of innocence, when what Opa said went, and I could only but open my eyes wide and beyond to see the flying bears, impenetrable towers or children turning into crows he wanted me to see with him.
Those pictures there are of the era of discovery and repetition. We marched through the mountains more then, and like most children, I wanted to learn how to be things. Perhaps an explorer, a wonderer and wanderer like my Opa. We’re even eating that apple in the same leisurely way, pushed to a side of the mouth so that we have space to reflect with our eating. Only I question the process.
In between these and beyond, are many more eras that rush through me in fragments, such as a mirrored image of myself dressed up with my Oma’s silk chawls, the shape of guitar strings imprinted on my fingers, selling sweets on the ping pong table in our garden, but never Werther’s. Those were too valuable.
And then I’m thirteen, and it’s the era of debating. I’d like to think that the common subject matter is about something such as the dignity in prostitution or a woman’s right to abortion, something real. It could also have been pure show, I don’t know. What I do know is that, remembering old today’s, after a day of feeling little, scared and unwanted, I have only to twist the knob to find Opa waiting on the soft brown leather sofa and a smile that reaches his eyes. He’ll have two glasses of water in front of him, and a Ritter Sport for each, that we’ll tear open together and eat as if we will never have the privilege to savour this moment again.
When I try to remember the next era, he’s not in it anymore.