An unforgettable laugh

Some laughter we do not forget for a lifetime. As varied as it may be, whether it is an approving grin, a benevolent to amorous smile, or a loud laugh, they are always forms of affection and thus a bridge from a you to the me. Sometimes we can observe couples where one smiles at the other, exuding a bond that leaves us speechless, and there is nothing more contagious than a hearty laugh that we can simply tune into.When I think of that long summer at the end of the 80’s and the twenty months of final goodbye to childhood that followed, I have their laughter in my ears again. And there are so many moments that pop up in my mind’s eye. Her enthusiastic and cheerful smile when I visited or picked her up for joint ventures. Her loud laughs when we were out and about and discovered strange things – even if it was just sparrows squabbling over bread crumbs. She always infected me when she would laugh out loud at something funny, and in doing so, she could also laugh so heartily at herself, at the little klutz in her and her bigger shortcomings. And when we were in company, she often helped us get over the speechlessness that sometimes set in and filled us with an infectious cheerfulness.

Without knowing it, she was a secret and wise teacher of laughter and thus of the joy of the little things in human connectedness.I had already met Traudl on the second day of my civilian service. I was supposed to pick her up for an excursion as part of the transportation service for the disabled. Someone had already brought her to the door of the small house and she was waiting in her wheelchair. As I approached, her face brightened and she greeted me with a smile. “No problem,” the civilian colleagues had said, “Traudl is a very nice spastic, you’ll definitely get along with her.” My insecurity quickly vanished during this first encounter, even though at that time I could not understand at all what this spastic paralysis with its jerky and completely unpredictable twitches meant. Since she was hidden as a child because of the spasticity, she had not learned to speak properly. But we found a common language, and over time I realized that her supposedly limited learning and perceptual abilities were not so much a mental disability as a result of her childhood social isolation. I had more and more the feeling that the disease of her nervous system limited only the spinal cord, but not the brain and thus her intelligence.

During her community service she was a constant companion to me, but after that I never saw her again. But I will never forget her laughter for the rest of my life.