The road to Bertramka

In the summer of 2000, Dirk and I undertook our last trip abroad without children. For five blissful days we discovered the beautiful and romantic city of Prague (the capital of the Czech Republic).

Vacations contain just the right mixture to get the two of us quarreling: Sharing a suitcase (Dirk’s a perfectionist. I, most emphatically, am not.), tiredness, excitement and uncertainty. We know it and not a trip has gone by when we haven’t had a fight of some sort.

This vacation was lovely, though. Dirk had planned everything to the most minute detail with a daily itinerary worked out for our entire stay. I’m more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kinda gal, but Dirk is talented at planning trips and I am always amazed at how I enjoy them. So, when he asked me if there was anything I particularly wanted to see, he did it with the clear expectation that I would say: “Dearest heart. You have exceeded all my expectations. There is nothing more that I would like to see.”

Instead I said: “I’d like to see Bertramka.”

Bertramka is the house that Mozart used and stayed in when he visited Prague. Dirk looked on the map. “Bertramka is kind of….out of the way,” he said, clearly wanting to indulge me, but also a bit miffed at my unintended criticism of his itinerary. And yes…. It was a bit out of the way. Even I, with my limited abilities with maps, could see it. For a moment I wavered, but then my inborn stubbornness won. “I’d still like to see Bertramka. Surely it can’t be that impossible?”

So, we took the underground, then a tram and then a bus. Finally we had to get off the bus. The area we walked through was hardly pretty, nor was it remotely romantic. Picture a huge construction site and you’d come close to it. It was in the heat of day and we walked and walked and walked. My feet ached and I wasn’t at all sure that I wanted to see Bertramka anymore. But stubbornness kept me silent. Finally we were totally lost. Or so we thought.

“Bertramka?” we asked a kindly-looking elderly gentleman. With an amused smile and a theatrical wave of his arm he indicated the gates right in front of us…

The house was lovely. I looked at the cool garden beyond and saw that cold drinks were being sold. I aimed in the general direction of those irresistible cold drinks, but Dirk caught me neatly around the waist and steered me into the house. “You wanted to see Bertramka,” he reminded me with clenched teeth. So, we walked around inside the house. Honestly I cannot remember a single detail about it any more. There was a Mozart piano concerto due to start, but, we didn’t have enough money for it. And, as it turned out, nor did we have enough money for the cold drinks that I craved. So, we made do by drinking water from a fountain.

Dirk had the good sense to ask for directions back to our apartment from the receptionist. She gave us quick directions to the closest bus stop. “Take the no 40 bus”, she advised.” It will take you straight to where the underground route starts again.”

Well, either both of us misunderstood or she made a mistake in giving the directions. Because, once again, it felt like we walked for miles before we stumbled on the bus stop. Then it took ages for a bus traveling in the direction we wanted to go to come along. And none of the buses were no 40… Finally we caught just any bus going in the right direction and would you know it? The number 40 buses were renamed recently to number 23…

By the time we got to the underground we were extremely tired, hot and bothered. And we weren’t exactly talking to each other. We stopped by a grocery store to get food and I took guilty offense at a slightly irritated inflection in Dirk’s voice. I burst into angry hot tears. The good citizens of Prague going home from work clearly wondered what Dirk had done to provoke such tears and I caught a few worried and accusing glances in his direction. Poor man!

If nothing else, the experience counted as an adventure and often afterwards, when one of us took a decision that caused the other trouble, we called it a Bertramka moment. We couldn’t predict that five years later we would face the greatest Bertramka moment of our entire lives together. And that it would take more than kissing and making up to save our marriage.

The mode of Loren’s birth was my choice. Dirk ideally would have preferred me to have a repeat C-section. At the time I said to him that I would take the responsibility for my choices. He pointed out that eventually the responsibility would have to be shared – that he would also have to deal with any situation going wrong.

If anything went wrong under normal circumstances, we would have been united. Now we were divided and that is a danger zone for any marriage.

Nobody would probably have blamed him if he packed up his things and left after Loren’s birth went horribly wrong. Yet he decided to stay. I could sense his ambivalent feelings. He is an honourable man who had to face a situation which seemed impossible. I would like to think that his love for me and the kids pulled him through. But in the end, I suspect it was a conscious decision.

He felt that he had to protect me from people judging me. And he had to fend for himself against people blaming him just as much as they blamed me.

His parents made things difficult – particularly his mother. Her response to our situation and to Loren still causes him hurt. Not only does he have to deal with trying to juggle things and to keep a semblance of order and happiness, but whenever he visits them, he has to deal with her tears and her inability to accept our son.

He cannot really share his emotions about his parents with me. I have had to decide that this is one ball I refuse to juggle on top of everything else. I am sorry about their feelings, but it is theirs to deal with. I might have felt different if I had the impression that they really cared about Loren. But it seems they are more concerned about what people think or say. And with that I have no patience.

We have gone through a long period of relative peace. Loren was healthy and showed remarkable progress, we were rested and things seemed on track.

But lately, Loren’s health started deteriorating again and everything around us is in upheaval. Dirk has had enough. He is unable to support me emotionally or physically. I know that and I try not to disturb him at night too.

Last night, Loren hardly slept. He was hyper-extending non-stop and only seems comfortable when I have him cradled against me in an upright position or when I walk around with him. I am so tired. Not only do I have a full-time job, but I have a demanding three-year-old, I am six months pregnant and I sleep virtually nothing at night. Yeah, know many of these things are my own choices, but something’s gotta give at some point..

Fortunately I know that the situation is temporary. The building work is done, Loren is on the right medication and we are working on building his condition, we shower the boys with love and this past week we reaffirmed our committment to one another.

It is just another hill or two and then we will reach Bertramka.

This time we’ll have those cold drinks and pause for a moment in the shade of some trees.