BLOOM A Dutch Maid in America Adriana was born and raised in Holland, but has lived in California for more than four decades. For the past four years she has been marketing products and reminders of Holland in her Dutches Store in the Carmel Plaza. Jan 2008

Adriana Roeloffs

My parents taught me to never go to sleep until the problems of the day are solved and the daily tasks are finished. So every day I work on the problems that belong to that particular day, then go to bed and sleep soundly, knowing that the next morning I’ll get out of bed to begin the day with a clean slate.

A Child of the War
I was born in Holland at the beginning of World War II. When I was still an infant my dad was rounded up along with a number of other able-bodied Dutch men and shipped off to Germany where he spent the next six years doing forced labor in a prison camp.

Dad actually had it much better than some of his neighbors because he became a German chauffeur, which was a relatively good job for a German slave. In 1945, just as the war was winding down, he escaped from his captors and rode on a bike that had no tires all the way back to the borders of Holland.

I never knew my dad until he returned from Germany. I had been too young when he was taken to have permanent memories of him as a person.

However, I was not the youngest child in the family. At the time of his capture my parents didn’t know that mom was pregnant with another child. My sister was two years old when dad returned.

During the war we were absolutely destitute. Holland was deprived of almost all growing things. Trees were all cut down for firewood. We became like a race of goats, harvesting in a bleak fashion whatever grew up from the ground.

Ravenous people devoured the leaves, stems, and stalks. Then they pulled up and ate the roots. People ate everything that grew; weeds, thistles, tulip bulbs, and grass would go into the cooking pots.

Like other people, our family was as poor as mice with neither food nor money. The government gave us food stamps, but nobody actually could get any food with them because the Germans intercepted all the cargo ships and rerouted them to Germany.

Even today there’s understandably some resentment against the Germans in Holland because of the horrors that the Nazis visited upon our country during all the years of their occupation.

Mom survived the war in any way that she could. I remember that she would stretch our meager supply of flour by mixing in scoops of sand in order to trick our stomachs into believing that we were getting more food than we actually were eating.

As the war began to wind down my mom went every day to the trains to meet her husband in case he would happen to come home.

After doing this for a whole year she finally gave up in despair and gave up her hope that he would return. But, ironically, the day, in 1946 that she quit meeting the train was the very day that he came back to us.

Postwar Holland transformed itself into a socialist state in which the government controls nearly everything. The state does a lot of things that people like. For example, employees must give workers five weeks vacation. Pay scales are rigidly controlled, and depend upon the worker’s age.

The social system takes care of every elderly person and places them in retirement homes that are nice with round-the-clock benefits.

Holland is a great place to live, especially for people with limited ambition. Dutch people can’t understand why we work so hard in America.

There’s a downside in the government’s willingness to take care of people. For example, my sister was laid off from her job and after a year continued receiving unemployment at the rate of 100% of her former wage.

Of course, my sister doesn’t care if she never goes back to work. The only requirement is that she has to apply three times a month for work and I’m sure she isn’t very energetic during any job interview she might be given.

Found by Love
When I became a young woman I took a job working in a clothing store. An American electronics engineer came into the store on November 22, 1963 to purchase porcelain pieces to take as souvenirs for his family in the U.S.

That was a day for both tears and joy. In Dallas President John F. Kennedy was shot, and in Amsterdam, Holland I was meeting the man who would become my husband. He liked my Delft Blue Porcelain pieces, but I could tell that the guy was absolutely smitten with me.

The day we met was the final day of what had been a six month contracting job for my future husband. He requested a three day extension to take care of what he euphe_mistically described as “unfinished business.”

He used the three days to convince me to come to visit him in the U.S. and then bought me a round-trip ticket. It was love at first sight for him, and I guess it was love after three days for me.

My parents were surprised at my behavior because I was usually a careful person who didn’t make impulsive decisions. I would have taken longer to think it over, but I didn’t have any longer. I had to take that return ticket or let him go. In either case the decision would have been rushed. Not making a decision in cases like this is, itself, a decision.

Two months later, on January 10, 1964, I used that plane ticket to go to America to meet my engineer and his family. Two months and ten days later we tied the knot, and I never did use the return part of that two-way ticket.

Only four months had elapsed from our first date until the trip to the altar. It does seem impulsive, but when you’ve hit the ball out of the park, as I?had with that guy, you might as well go ahead and run around the bases.

That was 43 years ago and it’s all still good. Great in fact! We have four sons and ten grandchildren. And the whole trip has been wonderful.

We lived in Saratoga, California for 30 years. My husband was managing apartments. We didn’t believe in raising latch-key children so I remained a stay-at-home mom until my youngest son was 27 years old.

When my kids were attending college at Cal Poly my house was always full of kids. We would have big dinners; everyone in the house during mealtimes was given a seat at the table. I believed that having the family at home was more important than going to any job. Family was number one.

With the kids grown I took a job as a floral designer in the Willow Glen section of San Jose, California. That job lasted for seven years.

Later I was doing floral design for a Pebble Beach Store called the Quail and Thistle. My girlfriend owned the store and when she became ill my husband and I moved to Carmel, I bought my friend out, and renamed the store The Dutches. Four years ago I moved my Dutches store to Carmel Plaza, where I’ve been ever since.

Besides doing floral design, I design custom clothes, do ward_robe coordination, arrange merchandise in the store, set up window displays, and empty the garbage. I have good help in the store but there’s nothing I don’t do sometimes.

I’m happy with my business and the place that my life has brought me to. I enjoy most people. I’m a good verbal communicator and glad to praise anything I like.

I’m a passionate person — a fervent homemaker in my house, eager wife to my husband, enthusiastic mom to my offspring, doting grandmother to their kids, and devout servant to my God. My personal faith plus a good sense of humor have provided me with stability over the years.

I’ve got the soul of a life-long learner and have taken all kinds of classes including such diverse topics as macramÈ, sewing, and guitar. I sing Soprano in a performing choir.

My dad always wanted to go back to Germany and visit Leipzig where he had been held captive. He wondered if the great churches and cathedrals were still ruined. We finally decided to make sure he did this. We had the trip all scheduled for August for his birthday 16 years ago but he died that March.

Dad never spoke to us about his experiences, but I know they were terrible. Literally unspeakable!

I still get back to Holland every year for a big family reunion, which we’ve now been celebrating for 43 years. We’re a close-knit family. I’m the keystone person who keeps family relations going. Last August at the reunion we celebrated my mom’s 90th birthday. Seventy-five relatives joined us for her big feast including numerous cousins and nieces from my generation.

Life is interesting! I’m happy as a clam after 43 years of marriage. We’re glad the kids are gone. No empty nest syndrome with us! We’ve had our share of family problems, but we refuse to be defined by them.

I love what I’m doing! I have an encouraging, healthy, happy spirit. My personal faith and positive attitude have seen me safely through wars and family problems.

Now we’re living with our boys and our grandkids in Carmel, California. All the suffering and death of my childhood seems long ago and far away.

I enjoy each day as it comes and always try to get the most out of it. You don’t get a chance to try that day again. You can never do a bad day over.

I’ve lived life to the full and have left nothing important undone.

I have treated my life as my parents so many years ago taught me to treat each day.

And so, when the sun finally sets on my life here on this earth, I plan to lie down with a feeling of confidence that I’ve finished all the tasks that were given me to do.

I will be ready to arise and to joyfully greet the morning that I’m sure will follow.

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