"I'm Brigitta..."

"You didn't tell me how old you are... Louisa."

A cute line of dialog from The Sound Of Music, my way of saying Rest In Peace to Maria von Trapp, called Louisa in the film, who was the last of the seven original singing von Trapp siblings. (The governess turned stepmother, played by Julie Andrews, was also named Maria, which is one reason the children's names were changed for the musical. She died in 1987.) Daughter Maria/Louisa died last week at the age of 99.

Reading about this Maria it seems to me that she was the one who set the whole "Sound of Music" phenomenon in motion. According to an autobiographical posting on the family website (www.trappfamily.com,) Maria had scarlet fever as a child and needed to be tutored at home, which led to a nice young nun from the local convent coming to be her teacher. (Calling adult Maria the "governess" to all seven children is another change to the story.) Although some dramatic license was taken by producers, the broad strokes of the story are correct. The teacher and the captain did get married, they did leave Austria to escape the Nazis, and they did become a famous singing group. Eventually (adult) Maria wrote a book called The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, and the rest is history.

So auf widersehen, good-bye to Maria/Louisa. May you flit, float, fleetly flee and fly!