It is hard to believe that it has been a year since my mother died. And what a year it has been. Lots of ups and downs, starting with the obvious, my mother's death, the memorial party at 2210 Jackson, the good bye from 2210 Jackson a few days later, (sort of) dealing with the contents from 2210 when they arrived at our house (the guest room is still not habitable...), and then on to the AIDS conference in Munich in March, which was dedicated to my mother. There I met a lot of her friends, so it was a good experience, but also not easy. Then on to Berlin where I met more friends of hers. One German group in SF.
Then the to-be-expected ups and downs sprinkled throughout the first year,  birthdays, anniversaries, Thanksgiving and then Christmas - without both of my parents.
I have not had much contact with anyone of her circle of friends, and am sort of sad that I was never really part of it. So much continuity is lost when someone dies. Freddie, our youngest, 13, said the other day, when we talked about my father and his WWII experiences, that we should document our lives so much more, to preserve memories for posterity.
Yesterday we had dinner at the Mandalay (4344 California Street) where we used to go a lot. A nice memory (and great food, too, in case you do not know it: try the ginger salad or/and the Burmese style noodle with tofu!).

Otherwise the year was busy with work on our start-up - we are finally launching before the end of February, in time for the ITB (world's largest annual travel trade fair in Berlin). Wish us luck!

Best wishes to you and yours, your projects and health, for 2011!

Es ist kaum zu glauben, daß es schon ein Jahr her ist, daß meine Mutter gestorben ist!
Zuerst gab es viel zu erledigen, Abschied von 2210 Jackson etc. Dann kamen die Münchner AIDS Tage, die ihrer Erinnerung gewidmet waren, und wo ich viele Freunde meiner Mutter kennenlernte. Das war gut aber nicht ganz leicht, alles war noch so frisch. Dann Berlin, wo ich noch mehr ihrer gute Freunde traf.
Dann kamen die normalen Auf und Abs, über Geburtstage, Jahrestage, Feiertage, diesmal ohne meine beiden Eltern.

Viel Kontakt habe ich im Laufe des Jahres mit wenigen ihrer Freunde gehabt. Vielleicht wird das wieder mehr werden.
Bitte meldet Euch wenn Ihr nach San Francisco kommt!

Gestern haben wir in einem burmesischen Restaurant in San Francisco gegessen, wo wir alle oft mit ihr aßen.

Ansonsten war das Jahr voll mit der Vorbereitung unserer "start-up". Wir werden vor Ende Februar starten, rechtzeitig zu der ITB (weltgrößte jährliche Reisemesse) in Berlin. Wünscht uns Glück!

Mit den besten Wünschen für ein gutes Jahr 2011.

Jack Poblocki had the great idea to try to raise the money required to get my mother's name onto the donor's wall at the museum, which was recently opened.
Many of you donated generously. You can see photos of the plaque here:
donations GLBT Museum

Thank you!

A friend, Bob Starkey, published a tribute to my mother on his blog.
Thank you Bob!

Check it out:

Annemarie Madison and Mahatma Gandhi