Generous Spirit - Welcome to the Heart of Europe
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Among others, Jenny came up with the last sentence in the back cover text of the book “So Long”: “Why things are the way they are and why they won’t stay that way!”
A Gentle, Kind and Generous Spirit
Jennifer Darlene Meidl was born in 1968 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. When she was three years old, she moved with her family to Harmony, Pennsylvania, where she spent her childhood and teenage years and made her first friends for life. She had a gentle mind and never talked badly about others.
Following her graduation from Seneca Valley High School, she studied German at Houghton College and as an exchange student in Vienna, where she met Oliver. After finishing her Bachelor of Arts degree, she returned to Austria, where they founded a family. Far from her home country, she made numerous international friends and was active in the English-speaking Methodist Church of Vienna.
After the birth of the first of her three children, Jenny gave up her job as an English teacher and bank clerk. It was not always easy to fully devote herself to her family and children, especially when her husband was on business trips, while she was actually the travel enthusiast. Only recently, when two of the three children had grown up and Oliver restricted his professional travel due to health issues, she began travelling more also without children. In May 2018, she celebrated her fiftieth birthday.
Her family, her friends and neighbors knew Jenny as a loving, warmhearted and very special person. Her surprising passing in November 2018 leaves us in shock. Her warm-heartedness should inspire us to be more like Jenny to the people around us. As a truly sincere, helpful and giving person, caring and supportive, she taught us so much about kindness. After her tragic passing, in her papers I came across a quote by Søren Kierkegaard: “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
On Christmas Eve, we put a branch of our Christmas tree on Jenny’s grave. The Christmas tree in our living room was missing a part just as she is missing in our family. We especially miss Jenny’s sense of humor and her smile. Her favorite joke was about a man who banged his head against the wall. His friend asked: “Why are you hitting your head on the wall?” And he replied: “Because it feels so good when I stop!” Let me also end here while I ask you to keep our beloved Jenny in good memory.