Everything Else is a Question

A lifetime has passed since my mother died, yet fragments of memory, old photographs, and unanswered questions keep her presence alive.My earliest memory of my mother is at home while my father was out — probably at work. She struggled to get up the stairs to the second floor of our small home. I remember helping her, but how much help could a three-year-old have been? I knew she was very sick, and when I next saw my father I told him all about it.My mother died when I was three years old. I am seventy-one now, and the truth is, I know almost nothing about her. I know where she was born. I know she met my father in Pittsburgh after the Second World War. Beyond that, she exists in fragments — small facts, old photographs, and a feeling that has never left me.One of the reasons I know so little is that my father almost never talked about her. I sometimes tentatively asked questions, but I could see how much pain it caused him. I met her brother in Germany several times and asked…