WALTRAUT lived
in one of those old - but not derelict -
wooden tenement houses
down on KUNGSGATAN (KING's STREET),
not far from THE ARTS MUSEUM,
THE CASTLE and THE HARBOUR;
a harbour that wouldn't develop (or decline...)
from its cranes & warehouses
to its present line-up of cafés, restaurants
and ice cream joints,
swarming with town folks, vacationers and tourists all summer,
for decades yet in the early 1970s,
when I became aware of WALTRAUT and her friends

She originally came from the neighbouring steelworks town
of OXELÖSUND out by THE BALTIC COAST,
where her father, originating in POLAND,
was some kind of boss

I never did get to know WALTRAUT well

She moved about in the periphery of the periphery

I knew she worked with photography and printing
in some kind of industrial printing shop,
close to where she lived

She appeared to - already at her young age -
be well on her way in an interesting line of work,
that promised a steady, quite reasonable, wage,
and good options for advancement

One autumn, drifting through said periphery
down along KING's STREET,
I chanced upon visiting WALTRAUT
with a few other people I hardly knew

I recall that I talked to her
about most people's unwillingness
to broaden their horizons and deepen their insights,
and she replied that she thought she understood
my view

WALTRAUT was pleasant & good looking,
somewhat buxom,
with brown eyes and thick, dark blond hair

She was a young, intelligent, creative and ambitious
woman,
about to broaden, deepen & fullfil her life

I couldn't keep myself from flirting a little bit with her,
albeit with no serious intent,
more like a spontaneous reaction...,
but, maybe a year later, in 1974 or thereabouts,
when visiting me at my place on the other side of the river
with three, four other peripheries,
she suddenly leaned towards me
when the others were getting ready to leave,
and the hour was getting late

It was obvious
that she wanted to spend the night

I got scared stiff

That seems like a weird and contra-indicative reaction,
and it was,
but I was shamefully inexperienced
and didn't really know how to behave accordingly
and was too cowardly to welcome the opportunity

I was totally immature, sexually;
the bell was tolling awfully loud,
and I didn't have to ask for whom...

I was mighty afraid of failure and ridicule,
and most certainly did not rise to the occasion

Expectations were stacked up
like long-haul trucks in a snowstorm on the highway,
and my self-esteem was dwindling
until you couldn't spot it anymore with you bare eyes,
so I acted uninterested and sleepy,
sort of shrugging her off,
giving her no option other than to leave
with the others,
among whom, incidentally,
was a gentle, intelligent, sensitive guy
by the name of CHRISTER BERGSTRÖM,
who, a couple of years later, drowned himself
in the river

Little did I foresee
that my cowardice at the bedside in 1974
would, in a roundabout way,
cause WALTRAUT's ill-timed death a decade later,
in the mid-1980s,
when she, with three friends,
after a summer night out on an island
in THE BALTIC ARCHIPELAGO,
returned to the tiny, local harbour on the mainland
in a small motor boat, and got into their car,
which instantly, by accident
and perhaps because of the peculiar shape of the quay,
drove over the side and tumbled into the water,
where all four young people drowned

WALTRAUT, who by then was a seasoned swimmer,
was found hanging out of one of the car windows,
having almost, but not quite, escaped

When I heard this reported at the police station
where I worked,
my feeling sank like a stone,
and I recalled the night when I didn't dare take her on,
a decade earlier

Had I, she most probably wouldn't have suffered
this horrible, untimely death
in the flower of her life,
having not been inside that car at that moment,
showing that any action one takes or refrains from,
may mean life or death for someone

My cowardice 1974 killed Miss WALTRAUT
a decade later