"Hurry, run back and kiss your mother goodbye." 

This is my most profound childhood memory.  Oh, but if you are in a hurry or you are interested only in my credentials, you may want to just scroll to the bottom of this page to view it.  But, if you have a little extra time, I will share with you the story of how I got to San Diego.  My story.  We all have one.

This is how my story begins.  I was born in Budapest, Hungary, to an ICU nurse mother and an architect/structural engineer father.  I have an older sister and an older brother.  Yes, I was the baby and, yes, I must be honest, I was babied.   It was a life of having nannies, as both my parents worked.  I was a very independent child and I remember going out to lunch after school by myself to a nearby restaurant because I loved the food there.  I remember being scolded by my mother when after an afternoon of playing with friends, I returned home with only one shoe on.  When asked where I had lost my shoe, because I had visited so many different friends in the neighborhood, I couln't even guess where my shoe could have fallen off.  I also have memories of making Christmas candies with my mom. 

We carefully wrapped each candy in waxed tissue paper extending about an inch on either ends of the candy, fringes cut on the ends, and then twisting that extra length of paper snuggly next to the sides of candy.  We then rolled a section of colored foil paper around the center, over the body of the candy.  We hung these from the Christmas tree as ornaments.  We also clipped small slim candles to the edge of the branches.  As we lit the candles on Christmas Eve, the colored lights flickered off the foil of the candies.  Sapphire blue, garnet reds and sterling silver. 

I also have memories of climbing up the spiral staircase of our large home, cool white walls and a very tall ceiling, stone steps worn where feet had travelled up and down them over many years.  I climbed these steps to go up to my room on the second floor.  I lived upstairs.  So did my father and brother.  My mother and my sister, a daughter from my mom's first marriage, lived downstairs.

I have many other childhood memories of Hungary, but the last one I have was when I was almost nine years old.  My father asked me if I had hugged my mother properly before we left the house.  We were almost to the corner of our street, my father, my brother and I.  Our old and worn suitcases waited patiently as my father sent me back to the house to kiss my mother goodby.  We packed enough belongings to last us one week.  We were just going to Lake Balaton to the vacation resort run by the Government for the employees of the architecture firm my father worked for.  This was a perk that the Communist government rewarded their workers with. 

I remembered being there in past years.  It was right on the edge of the lake.  There were lots of other families there.  We spent lots of time in the lake.  We lazily floated on thin air mattresses, boats and white sails hung low on the horizon behind us as a backdrop.  I watched my teenage sister flirt with boys.  I remember the tiny little fish swimming on the edge of the lake in shallow water.  They would pool together forming a dark cloud close to green deceivingly velvety rocks that were as slick as the winter ice on the community ice rink.  There were also lots of kids to play with.   

It is also where my father taught me to ride a bicycle.  He was running along side me holding on to the back of the bicycle as I used all my strength and concentration to balance the bike.  The handle bar would begin to go off-course and I would quickly straighten it out.  I stared straight ahead onto the path and dared not even glance to the side to see if my father was still beside me holding on, but I knew he was no longer there.  A surge of excitement and fear ran through me.  I remember I always enjoyed going to the lake resort.  I remember the excitement and anticipation I felt that day, of catching the bus to take to the Eastern Train Station. From there we would catch a train to the lake and be there by the afternoon.

I remember sitting in the back of the bus and alerting my father that we had missed our stop at the train station.  I worriedly looked out the back window and saw the station as we got further away from it.  In a very quiet voice he informed me that we were going to the West Train Station.  I protested.  Those trains were international.  They did not go to the lake!  My voice must have been too loud, shrill and excited, and must have attracted too many glances from the few other passengers who were on the bus but several rows in front of us, for my father startled and became nervous.  My brother looked at my father.  I could tell that he too was nervous, waiting for my father to do something to quickly quiet me.   My father spoke in a bearly audible tone.  He explained in a pithy manner that the reason that we were going to the West Train Station was because we were not going to the lake at all.  Instead, we were going to Copenhagen, Denmark.  He instructed me to not say anything else about it. 

I remember taking the train away from Hungary.  This was even more exciting than going to the lake.  Wait until all my friends found out about this!  I always envied my friend whose father travelled abroad for business.  When he returned after one of his trips, he took my friend and I out for ice cream.  He seemed so important and extravagant.  Now everyone would envy me when I returned to school in the fall.  I would be instantly popular.  My head was filled with thoughts and fantasies.  I had many questions but knew not to ask my father anything. 

My father briefly got off the train at a stop in Germany.   I watched him weaving through the many people until I lost sight of him.  There were people having conversations all around me but I did not understand any of it.  I would later get used to not understanding my world around me.  I learned to just go along.

It would later become fun to listen to the rhythm of languages.  I sometimes pretended to speak such languages.  I would replicate the sounds but the words made as much sense as the words I heard when spoken by all those strangers.  But now, my father out of sight, those sounds were frightening.   I kept asking my brother when our dad was coming back for us.  He might miss the train.  Then what?  Where were we supposed to go then?  I remember scanning the many faces for him.  I was so relieved when I finally spotted him quickly making his way back to "me."  He looked very pleased.  Smiling.  I asked him where he was gone for so long.  He told me that he sent my mother a post card telling her that we were on our way to Copenhagen. 

My father was not cruel.  I think it was the only way he could let my mother know not to expect us back from the lake.  At that time we did not have a phone.  He also had to time the delivery of the message so that he would be safe in Copenhagen by the time my mother received it and that we could not be deported back to Hungary.  He would face certain death if he were caught trying to defect.  So, at that time, the news would be delivered to my mother via a post card.  And probably not for a week or so after we had left.  My mother never showed me the post card.  I don't know what she ever did with it.  I wonder what picture was on the front.  How it must have first intrigued her, then how horror must have set in once she realized whom it was from and what the content of the message was.  How a wonderful summer trip to the lake could have translated into the loss of two of her children.

Once in Copenhagen, Denmark, my father quickly found a job as an architect.  For many months we lived in a hotel at the edge of a beautiful park.  At the park was a large bronze statue of a seated Hans Christian Anderson.  He was the author of many wonderful children's fairy tales.  I knew his stories well since I was very little.  I often closed my eyes and gently flew around the royal grounds, seated on the soft feathered back of a huge beautiful white swan.  I firmly held on to my tiara so it wouldn't fly off.  If I lost it I would be scolded by my Queen mother.  Whenever I walked home to the hotel through the park, I intentionally detoured on the path past Mr. Anderson so I could pass him and tell him hello. 

Our hotel room was decorated in sleek modern furniture.  They servied breakfast every morning in a fancy dining room  It had deep red foil wallpaper with ornate gold scrolls that was fuzzy and soft to the touch.  The Royal Palace was near the hotel.  My father pointed out the Queen and King during one of our walks as they drove past us. 

The hotel had strict rules against cooking in the guest rooms.  The hotel staff, in a slightly elevated voice, would insist that my father must have been cooking in the room.  How else would rice keep clogging the sink pipes in our room?  My father would shake his head and slowly raise and lower his shoulders.  The staff would also shake his head and proceed to clear the sink pipes.  I sat on the bed and pretended to be busy, avoiding eye contact with everyone in the room.  We eventually moved to a small apartment, and soon we received our visas to immigrate to the U.S.

We travelled throughout Europe, stopping to visit every museum and historical sight in Paris, Rome, Pisa, Isle of Capri and Naples.  There, we boarded a huge ship for New York.  After the experience at the train stop in Germany, I didn't want to lose sight of my father.  Especially during the emergency training when we were instructed to, in another set of incomprehensible rhythmic sounds, put on life vests! 

Life in America

After ten long and very queasy days at sea, we sailed past Ellis Island and caught sight of the Statue of Liberty.  After disembarking the ship, my father then took photos of us, pointing the camera upwards, capturing the incredible heights of the skyscrapers that surrounded us.  It must have been exhillerating for my father to experience in person these monoliths he had only seen in photos.  This is what he studied about, and now here he was.  He breathed it in deeply so these buildings became a part of him.  

After a week, we boarded a bus and headed for San Francisco.  We got as far as Pittsburg when my brother suddenly became ill.  I immediately diagnosed him with Appendicitis.  I knew this because I remembered my sister's symptoms were identical.  He was transported to a hospital by ambulance.  As I sat alone on a bench in the long corridor of the hospital, I listened to the echoing rhythm of incomprehensible words, muffled.  My father joined me and confirmed my diagnosis.  We found a room in the city.  I could not take my eyes off the huge cars with fins on either sides of the trunks.  They took up so much space and the passengers in them seemed so small.  There were not many cars in Hungary.  The cars there were small.  Very small.  We had one but it never ran and my mother always yelled at my father for having waisted so much money on it.  His time should be better spent around the house. 

Another week or so later, we were on a train, heading for San Francisco again.  My father found work and we rented a nice home in Burlingame, a suburb south of San Francisco.  My brother and I both attended school and eventually some of the incomprehensible sounds became words that I understood.  They became a link to teachers, to neighbors, to friends.   

My father commuted to work in the city but was now unable to work as an architect/engineer because he was not licensed to practice in the U.S.  Each night while we were still in Hungary, he would pull out a hidden English Language book and study it in secret.  Still, he did not speak English well enough to be able to take the California test that was required for architects and engineers to receive licenses to practice.  Caring for two children did not leave him much time to study.  So, he just kept up the best he could.  Soon it proved too much for him and he was hospitalized.  I watched the ambulance take him away.  I stayed at the neighbor's house until a woman came and had me pack a suitcase.  I was then placed in a temporary foster home and a few months later another one.  My brother had a friend whose divorced mother took him in. 

Once my father was better, he moved to San Diego, got another job, rented a nice apartment and bought a brand new car.  After nearly a year apart from our father, we were reunited.  He picked my brother and I up at the airport in our brand new white Nove.

My life as an adult

Fast forward many years.  I have travelled around quite a bit.  I lived in Japan for almost a year, and went as far as Hong Kong.  However, I remained living in San Diego.  I married a wonderful man, David, whom I met at the condo complex where we both lived.  He had an ideal upbringing.  His parents were married for over 50 years and David was one of four kids.  He is incredibly smart, kind, funny, handsome, and stable.  We have been married for 21 years (together for 24 years) and we have two wonderful sons.  We also have two dogs and a cat.  We live in a house on top of a hill and have a view like the one I used to see as I child with closed eyes, swooping in the sky on the back of the majestic white swan.  We don't travel much now.  Other than the eighth grade East Coast trip our oldest son went on with his school, our children travelled outside of California for the first time just a couple of years ago.  The oldest one is in college now.  I know, I don't look old enough to have a child that age.  Thank you.  You are very sweet.

Education

Like my life, education did not occur for me normally as for most people.  I entered San Diego State University as an Electrical Engineering major but I temporarily placed school on hold while having our two sons.  I discovered jewelry making through a local community college course I took for fun.  I knew I couldn't express my design ideas without learning everthing I could about jewelry making.  It was also very important to me to earn a college degree and to finish what I started.  Thank you to all of you who made it possible for me to finish while my boys were in preschool and grade school.  It was incredibly challenging at times, but I did graduate with honors from San Diego State University and was a Magna cum Laude with a B.A. in Art, Applied Design with an emphasis in Metals.  I am incredibly fortunate to have studied under Helen Shirk and Arline Fisch.  They are both wonderful instructors and wonderful generous people.    

Spanish Village Arts and Crafts Center in Balboa Park, San Diego, California

I have been a member of Spanish Village Arts and Crafts Center in Balboa Park, San Diego since 1991.  I left only long enough to go to school.  For a few years after graduating, I taught Arts and Crafts to Older Adults through San Diego Community College District and also through Grossmont Union High School District.  I worked with older adults and disabled adults.  It was very enriching and I often think that my students taught me way more than I could have ever taught them.

On the weekends I would set up my display booth outside on the patio at Spanish Village Arts Center and sell my jewelry  creations.   During the week I taught my classes.  I enjoyed the Village so much and the demand for my jewelry grew to the point that I eventually had to make the decision to give up teaching. 

I love the beauty of Spanish Village and I get to meet so many interesting people from all over the world.  I am among over 200 wonderful artists who, like me, love to create art and work hard at making Spanish Village a beautiful, nurturing and educational place, welcoming even the unsuspecting visitor who just happened to be walking through the park.  I am very fortunate to be able to enjoy all of this while being able to do what I enjoy so much, designing and creating jewelry.  

Artistic Influence

My work is greatly influenced by the ocean and other organic forms found in nature, the rich details of traditional European art that I saw in all the museums and old buildings I visited, the clean aesthetics of the Danish Modern style and the delicate designs of Japan.  I am thrilled that you love my creations and you inspire me to keep creating!  My work is dynamic, so please keep checking the website for new designs.  As you can see, my jewelry designs emerge from many rich personal experiences.

Please e-mail me and let me know what you think.  jewelrybysusanyoung@cox.net.  Let me know of any questions you may have about my story that I may have forgotten to expand on.

Most of all, enjoy life.  Everything that happens in life is a learning experience so be there and pay attention.  We may not be able to control the things that happen but we can learn to control what we can do afterwards.
 
Susan Young