Open Letter to Rolf Anders

Rolf,

This week I have seen more of you then I have before. We sat in your office and at your dinner table looking at the photos you collected through the years. The thing that strikes me the most about these random moments captured by lens is two-fold: the smiles and the way that no matter what time period the photo is from you were always on a journey. Some were black and white, others full of color, and some slowly fading proving that even time can take these moments away. Some men live lives where they shelter themselves in a community and never venture far away from it. Others live their lives like that of Odysseus; always at sea looking for home and adventure. Looking at these pictures is seems you found that passage somewhere in between. I will never forget that moment just weeks ago when your daughter and I came to see you in the hospital and that even though you were in pain you still looked up at me and summoning all your strength you managed in English and with something of a smile "Nice to see you." You were a fighter, I don´t use that term lightly as it is laden with cliches and other images that don´t tell the real story behind everything you went through. I saw you again a few days after you closed your eyes for the last time. While I cannot say that you looked as handsome as you had the first time we met; just after Christmas at Adenauer Airport (I was nervous and I am sure you were as well), I can say that as I sat there I could see that the suffering was over. At the memorial ceremony there were over a hundred present and I sat there thinking to myself how strange it is that these people lighting candles; that they were able to know you and that I was now sentenced to only see you and them captured on those photos we found in your drawers and albums. They cried because they knew you and knew what they had lost when they had lost you; a friendship and more importantly a friend. I cried because I had lost a person who I would never have a chance to befriend. I don´t think you ever expected to create the chain of events that brought me to where I am now. I will remember you and these pictures will tell stories that even your grandkids will laugh and smile about.

Your soon to be son-in-law,

Aron