Epilogue

 

 

It must have been during the first half of 1946 that Anek met his future wife and my mother, Eugenia Cymer, who was known to all as Krysia, most probably during a visit to his maternal uncle, Ignacy Gutman, who survived the war with his family in the Lodz ghetto.[35] According to Ignacy’s daughter, Anek immediately fell in love with Krysia who seems to have been less enthusiastic, as can be judged from her October 1946 letter to her friend Ala Ratner:

 

As concerns Anek, he causes me a lot of headache. He registered in the Higher School of Commerce and since the beginning of October is in Lodz. He lives with us because it is difficult to find a room and, in fact, we only waited for the return of my Daddy [from the Anders Army] to marry. But now, when the marriage is just about to take place, there are renewed difficulties, as usual on my side. This means that I am disturbed by the thought that he has no concrete profession and I cannot see how we can manage from the financial point of view. I find it difficult to only count on my parents, I would feel terribly in such a situation.[36]

 

Nevertheless the marriage took place in December 1946 after Anek, most probably because of some pressure by his bride, decided to renew his studies of architecture interrupted in 1939 by the war. “The wedding night was very original – wrote Krysia to Ala in her letter of 29 December – because Albert [Anek’s friend from Kalisz, Albert Gerlach who came to Lodz for the wedding] played the role of the “bride”, meaning that they slept together and I in my room”.[37]  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few years after my birth in September 1947, the family moved to Warsaw, where Anek, who in the meantime finished his studies of architecture, obtained a prestigious position in the team who planned a new living quarter (known as MDM) in the center of the city which was totally ruined during the war.

 

In the summer of 1960, while travelling on vacation with his family in his old car, Anek was killed in a road accident.