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The Road Taken: A Memoir - One VW Bus, One Widow, Nine Kids

by Therese Powers Kramer; Cover Design or Artwork by Robert B. Kramer; Edited by John E. Kramer and P. Damian Kramer; Illustrated by Mary T. Kramer

195 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #07-0069; ISBN 1-4251-1668-X; US$16.50, C$18.97, EUR12.86, £8.53

Widowed with nine children in 1967, Therese Kramer took her family on an unforgettable European adventure in 1968. Let her take you along for the ride with this touching tale.

About the Book

It started with a simple bet shortly after I became a widow left with nine children to raise. Leafing through a National Geographic, losing myself in the world of possibilities, I'd often comment, "Maybe someday we'll visit there." (Fill in the blank: Holland, Ireland, France, Austria, whatever the magazine was serving up as country du jour in any edition. I wasn't fussy.) Fields of tulips with a windmill in the background whispered Holland was calling, men and boys bedecked in lederhosen and Tyrolean hats were equally fascinating.

Anne, sixteen, threw down the gauntlet with, "We'll never go to Europe. You just talk about it whenever you read an article about it."

"Want to bet?" I challenged.

We agreed on five dollars to be paid to me on the plane as soon as we were airborne. The rest, as they say, is history. As we wended our way merrily through most of the trip, I exulted in having won the bet, but on other occasions, such as going over the Alps by mistake, I wished I had let her win the five bucks.

About the Author

I grew up in Edgewater, NJ, attended George Washington elementary school (called grammar school way back when). Saint Cecilia High School in Englewood, NJ where I had the legendary Vince Lombardi as a teacher for Latin as a freshman and chemistry as a senior. For reasons known only to him he decided to call me "Tess." I may be the only student to have received a "gift" from the great coach in the form of a nickname, but I would gladly have returned it. However it stuck for four years. Out of high school in 1943 and into a defense plant in the middle of WWII for a year then to State Teachers College in Jersey City, NJ for one year. From there to the business world, New York and New Jersey business offices of Ma Bell. Married on New Years Eve morning, 1949 in the rectory of Holy Rosary Church in Edgewater, NJ. My career began with the birth of our first child in 1949 on St. Valentine's Day 1953. Yes, motherhood is a career. In 1958, with five children in tow, we moved into the beautiful home my husband, Bernard, build for us on Swan Street in the Palisades, NY. When our ninth child, John, was eight months in 1965, I returned to the hallowed halls of learning at Saint Thomas Aquinas College, Sparkill, NY, graduating in 1968 with a B.S. in elementary education. An M.A. in learning disabilities from Fairleigh Dickinson University, Teaneck, NJ, in 1972 led to a position in South Orangetown School District from 1971 to 1973 when we moved to Sunapee, NH. In 1980, we moved to New Mexico where college education was affordable for my youngest children.Our home was a charming abode in historic Mesilla, NM. In 2004 I returned to Rockaland County, NY - a happy, happy day. I live at Thorpe Village which sits on the same site as Saint Thomas Aquinas, my Alma Mater. As far as I'm concerned I'm back on campus.