August 23 was the birthday of my mother-in-law, Marie Johanna, called Rita. To me she was ‘mother’. I met her when I was 17 and she was 43 years old. She lived to be 82 and as her whole generation, she had to cope with two world wars and a nasty depression.

Married at 22, this new bride born and raised in the cold and wet Netherlands, went to live with her husband in the Belgian Congo the only place where he could find work during the depression). No air conditioning in those days. She gave birth in Leopoldville to her first son in May 1933, Frits, who was to become my husband. Her husband did not know how to express his utter delight at the birth of his son and was reported to have stood on his head for joy. A second son was born three years later.

There was no fairytale ending. Her husband died of myasthenia gravis in 1942 in the Netherlands. Several years later Rita was engaged to be married to a Jewish underground worker. He was caught and shot to death, so called as an example.

She wrote five books after the war under the pen name Marianne Benninck, the first one being an autobiography of the war years. In Dutch, unfortunately.

She was a charming woman, who had many friends. She also had dreams for her two sons, like most mothers. I was not part of those dreams, as she did not want her sons to marry at a young age. However, Frits did and I came to be accepted. She was actually always very kind to me, except that she did not agree with me having so many children. I wish we could have had more time together.