Reflections of a Summer in Bingen

The retired schoolteacher struggled with his journal entry about his missing Ella.

Old age, loneliness, despair, anger gnawed at him. He crumpled the page he had

been writing on and tossed his pen down the stairway in frustration. July 2009 – the

midst of a blackout in Shreveport. The flickering light of emergency candles on the

large wooden table did not soften the octogenarian’s grief over the sudden loss of his

dearly departed wife of 50 years. Dwight shouted, “I need you Ella. I need you.

Come and join me honey. I cannot live without you.” The flashlight that he

retrieved from the mahogany cupboard illuminated memories of the summer of

1975: Bingen on the river Rhine, the blonde-haired Fraulein Helga. He smiled as he

recalled that first meeting with the beautiful blue-eyed Rhineland maiden. His

reminiscences about the secret affair with Helga soothed his misery and loneliness,

while guilt deluged him at the thoughts of leaving Ella behind in Baton Rogue. He

wept in a stuttering voice, “El-, El-, Ella, how, how, how could I’ve, I’ve done, done

this to you. For-, for-, forgive me, me, for cheating on you.” Afterwards, Dwight

wondered, what became of Helga?

Jamal Ali