The Foreign Service Journal, November 2018

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | NOVEMBER 2018 63 every session with these wise women. The original members are gone now, many of them having lived into their 90s. The too- young Alice Slattery died, too, in 2008. Gail Shisler, Wendy Mon- tanari and I continue to write and remain friends, but the original AAFSWWriters’ Group is no more. The last was Maria Bauer, who had first invited me to the group. Her passing in April marked the end of an era. You could call it the era of growing up in the 1930s and going through the horrors of the Second World War. But her life, like others’ in the group, turned into a celebration of the American dream. “Maria went from a privileged upbringing in Europe to an escape in front of the Nazis and a life of service to her new country,” says Gail Shisler. “I always thought the picture in her living room expressed what immigration should be about. It was taken on her son’s last day working for President Barack Obama. In it is the Czechoslovakian immigrant who married an Austrian immi- grant, with their son, who is the legal counsel to the first black president.” The End of an Era A World of Difference is now two generations old. There is, indeed, a world of difference between that time and now. Forty years ago, there was not only no internet, but no computers. Writers used a manual typewriter or wrote longhand on yellow legal pads. Diplomats, and spouses in particular, lived far more isolated lives than succeeding generations of FS families, often relying on their own resources and communities when a medical or political crisis arose. America’s stature in the world was proud and strong. Many of the members of the AAFSWWriters’ Group lived and served through World War II, and felt that their role in the Foreign Service, as officers or wives, was a continuation of that service. They have disappeared now, one by one, and new Foreign Ser- vice generations have taken their place. But their writing remains, leaving us glimpses into a world that was unlike ours, but an experience that had threads in common with that of FS members today. As original member Ingeborg Carsten Miller wrote: I am walking from one world to another, a chameleon forever changing color. I wander in different worlds Stumble in another language Accept, adapt to misunderstandings. How far will I go Before I know When and where to settle? Maybe there’s not such a world of difference after all. n