When My Mind Jumps Back

Ach du lieber Augustin

Augustin, Augustin * Ach du lieber Augustin alles ist hin. * Frau ist weg, Kind is weg, * Blah, blaba Blah blaba . . . . That’s one of the songs, tune and all,  that pops into my head when I wake up during the night or first thing in the morning before I get out of bed. The text doesn’t roll out further because I don’t think I ever knew how it went on, not remotely to the whole song that is to be found on the internet.

   I think of this as just one example of  the way an old mind jumps back to its youthful origins. (This did not happen to me until fairly recently, hence the diagnosis of this as a symptom of advanced age.) Lots of those popups are in German which I spoke with my parents even after we lived in the US for years. More of those German songs below.

   But one very persistent visitor from the past is in English, the advertising jingle for Pepsi Cola. WQXR, the “good music (radio) station” to which I mostly listened had a policy of not broadcasting the words of the standard advertising jingles of the day. But they did play the tune of the Pepsi Cola jingle on the xylophone, as I recall it. The words had to be learned  from other sources, of which there were plenty. I certainly was acquainted with them, so I here recite the full text. I could also supply the melody and if need be would write it down, but it can probably be found on the internet. Here is the full text, punctuation courtesy of yours truly:

                                    Pepsi Cola hits the spot.

                                    Twelve full ounces that’s a lot.

                                    Twice as much for a nickel too,

                                    Pepsi Cola is the drink for you.

   But that’s just about the only piece in English that wells up. Here are the beginnings of some of the other German ones. Indeed, most of these visitors from the past are limited to their opening lines. There is

                                    Hänschen klein

                                    Ging allein

                                    In die weite Welt hinein

                                    Kopf und Hut

                                    Stehn ihm gut . . . .

That one had a special meaning since that Hänschen is the diminutive of Hans, the name of my younger brother, now deceased.

   Another emergent from the past is a quasi-military one:

                                    Ich hat einen Kameraden

                                    Einen besser’n finds du nicht.

                                    Er luf an meiner Seite,

                                    Im gleichen Schritt und Tritt . . . .
That one became very popular during the Nazi period, while the next one, that now and then haunts me, was actually banned by the Nazis, if I remember correctly:

                                    Die Gedanken sind frei

                                    Wer kann sie erraten.

                                    Sie fliegen vorbei

                                    Wie nächtliche Schatten.

                                    Kein Mensch kann sie wissen,

                                    Kein Jäger erschiessen . . . and back to die Gedanken sind frei.

There are a few others, but none goes beyond the opening lines. Of course I know the melodies for all of them and would write them down and translate them into English, but most of what I take up here is likely to be found on the infinitely stocked internet.

   One popup of somewhat more recent vintage, plus a final anecdote. First the inimitable Marlene Dietrich in Der Blaue Engel:

                                    Ich bin von Kopf zu Fuß

                                    Zur Liebe eingestellt

                                    . . . .

                                    Die Männer flitten um mich

                                    Wie Motten um das Licht.

                                    Und wenn sie dann verbrennen,

                                    Dafür kann ich gaaaaarnichts.

Finally, another remembered and recurring tune, a line from Old Man River:

                                    Tired of livin’ and afeared of dying. . . .

And that reminds me of an exchange I had with Henrietta Smith, a good friend, who was chairperson of the department of psychology when I was at Vassar:

            I am not, said Henrietta with some emphasis, an African-American. I’m a Negro!

Well, for some purposes at least, the once common noun of Negro has to stay alive after all. Do you want to call Old Man River an African-American spiritual? Brrrr, it’s a Negro Spiritual.