The High Life in Deutschland -Living in Germany in the 1980’s

I was incredibly lucky to get to live in (what was then West) Germany from 1983-86. After I graduated from the University of Kentucky with a degree in journalism, I decided I wanted to go live in Europe. I was a planner from an early age, so I took a secretarial job, lived at home saving my money, and plotted my launch.

After travels around the British Isles with friends from high school (which is the subject of a future post) and sojourns in France and Switzerland, I landed in Wiesbaden, Germany – just west of Frankfurt, on the Rhein River at the ripe age of 23.

In the mid-1980’s, the Cold War waged with West Germany in its cross-hairs, and there were close to 300,000 American miliary personnel stationed in Germany, with thousands more in Italy, Spain, the UK, Belgium, the Netherland, Greece and Turkey. A huge economy existed around these active-duty soldiers, airmen and sailors. The Dept of Defense Dependent Schools, or DODDS, employed thousands of American teachers to teach the thousands of American children on military bases. Civilian contractors worked in the base exchanges (department stores) and commissaries (grocery stores), printing the Stars and Stripes newspaper, and running Trips and Tours offices. Continuing education was necessary for promotion in the military (and if you didn’t get promoted, you were kicked out), and colleges and universities contracted with the military to provide that education.

My parents were best friends in Kentucky with a retired Air Force colonel and his wife, who were living in Germany running a program offering masters degrees for officers, and my brother had married one of their daughters.

They graciously invited me to stay with them when I arrived in Germany, then managed to find me a job with another of the schools (City Colleges of Chicago). Even better, another of their daughters had moved there and needed a roommate, so I had an apartment!

I had a low-level administrative job, working with Education Centers on bases from Spain to Bavaria to England. Personal computers were in their infancy (and we didn’t have ’em), and I managed faculty and equipment with a telephone and a typewriter. My office was on an American military base that had been built for the Germans in the 1930s. The sense of history was palpable, and I could walk to work.

I got paid in dollars, and with a great exchange rate at that time, our rent got cheaper every month. Allison and I lived in a first-floor apartment with 2 bedrooms, a bathroom, living room and kitchen, and incredibly high ceilings. It was downtown, a block from the bus station and 2 blocks from the main “fussgangerzone”, or pedestrian shopping district. It was heaven, and across the street from a bakery. There was always champagne in the fridge and fresh flowers on the table. And we could go to France for lunch!

I made $14,000 a year, tax-free because I lived overseas. I had no debt, no need of a car (hello, public transport!), or health insurance (American military health care) and both American and German holidays off work. My roommate and sister-in-law was my wingman and travel companion, and we LIVED to travel.

EVERY holiday and all vacation days were spent travelling – Copenhagen, Spain, Rome, Garmisch, Paris, Prague, Stockholm, Lucerne, Vienna, Strasbourg, Salzburg, Crete – always on a shoestring, often on short notice, all unforgettable. 3-day weekend? Off to Berlin. Christmas holiday? Skiing in Switzerland! I can take 2 weeks in a row in the summer? Come on, friends from home, we’re cruising the Greek islands!

I worked with Americans so I spoke English all day, but studied German both on base and in the “folkshochschule” (community adult ed) with people from lots of countries, and German was the only common language. I would never say I was fluent, but I could get by in most situations.

Phone calls were ruinously expensive, and my family, friends and I wrote letters every week. I probably spent an hour a night writing (we had no TV), and it took about 1 week for a letter to get back home through the military mail system, and another week for the reply to arrive. The thought of FaceTime or Zoom would have been like something out of the Jetsons…Thank God the movie “Taken” had not come out. It was a pre-911 world, and we took risks that make my hair stand up today. My guardian angel was working overtime in those days.

We went to the market on Saturday mornings to buy produce, bread and cheese. I soon learned NOT to buy more than I could carry the 4 blocks back to my house. We went to free concerts in churches, picnics in vineyards, and looked forward to the wine festivals every year. There were cruises on the Rhein, Fasching (Mardi Gras) parties in costume, Oktoberfest in Munich and a Bruce Springsteen concert in Frankfurt.

I rode a bicyle, took the bus when it rained and could read a train timetable like a pro. I rode trains, took ferries, and rode trains ONTO ferries. Remember aerobics? I was a fitness instructor as a second job, and taught at the base gym and at a fitness studio downtown. My bedroom was always festooned with air-drying tights and leotards everywhere. I did draw the line at leg-warmers, though…

I loved shopping in German shops, and at Next and Benetton. I was too rigid to stray far from my Preppy Handbook dogma, so it was a bit like Flashdance meets LL Bean…I do remember a cashmere/lambswood navy sweater dress with a huge V down the back. I loved the way it felt on bare skin.

So how did this idyllic existence end? At the altar! Allison and I both met and eventually married Air Force officers, and moved with them back to the US. Ultimately, both marriages ended in divorce, but we have also both found true love and happiness the second time around. Her sister is still married to my brother, Allison now lives about 5 miles from me and we are still close friends.

As I looked through old photos preparing this post, I was struck by 2 things: 1) we took very few photos of ourselves in those days. I have lots more photos of the people I’m traveling with, and of architecture, that of myself. I spent 4 days in Vienna and do not have ONE photo of myself there. 2) I took AWFUL photos! I had a beloved 35mm SLR with a zoom lens, and my photos are usually underexposed, often blurry and with very dodgy composition. I can’t believe what I can do with a phone camera now. I’ll see what I can do with some editing…

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little trip down memory lane with me. I’m very aware of the privilege I had to live like this for so long. Some people save for years to do this for 2 weeks. I’m grateful for the luck I’ve had and the perspective these experiences have given me about people from other cultures and ways of life. And I can’t wait to go back!

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