In Dovercourt she returned to office work. She liked it. She learned fast, remembered everything and excelled. As always, she was charming and persuasive, helping her employers see the value in promoting her. While at Griesbach she found herself in a secretarial job at the department of comparative literature at the University of Alberta where Des was getting a degree in history. It suited them fine to work there together and Inge made many dear friends, such as June Panteluk and Joan McDonald, but none so close as Ann Henderson-Nichol, who was a frequent companion for decades, often dining with Inge and family.

Inge’s working, made the Browns a steady double income household. She had elevated herself, for the first time, above the working poor, and never looked back. She was now in the world of the disposable income and it came with a dishwasher on wheels and regular shopping at the Ports store. She never looked back.

In 1973 they moved into 58 Falcon Crescent, St Albert, Alberta and the salad years began in earnest. For Inge and Des it was the era of the dinner party, faculty club events and fancy holiday celebrations. Inge, already a keen practitioner of Christmas, had a great time with all the graduations, convocations and birthdays, thanksgivings and other celebrations over the years. She loved a party with food and wine, good conversation and laughter. And if you could throw in some fancy clothes, a costume even, and music, preferably live music, she was in heaven.

It was when she met Ann and her opera loving coterie (led by Linda Arseneault), with erudite conversation skills, that Inge and Des started buying seasons tickets to the Edmonton Opera where they watched performances from the first balcony for 40+ years. And they dined with these people for at least as long. Des and Inge were very different people from one another, with different tastes but they were glued together by opera. The were both positively rabid for it. Inge was adventurous and wide ranging, Des was for melody and anything written by Mozart.

They had fun too at 58 with their St Albert neighbours over the years. On one side, neighbours Paul and Doris, in their neat modern brown bungalow, were a constant with their big, close, joyful family who adopted Des and Inge over time, their kindnesses often spilling over into Des and Inge’s yard.

So many great people came and went from the yellow duplex next door including Harry and Ralph, the rambunctious little blondes who kept their corner of the crescent in a constant state of excitement for several sleepless years, the Eskimos football player who once brought a horse from a poker win to his yard and Barb and Kevin who started their delightful family there, and kept an eye on Des and Inge – in their 70s. Then Rob and his wife Dodi moved in and carried on looking out for their elderly neighbours.

The horse was great. It filled the view from the Brown's dining room window and it arrived on Jan 1st, Inge’s birthday, sometime in the 70s, after an enthusiastic New Year’s Eve, they reminisced, to test their powers of perception after such enthusiastic indulgence.

Next to the yellow duplex was a white house with a slow succession of owners that often became neighbourhood friends like the Butterys and the long-time Lubbers who grew their family there for years. Val Lubbers was one of the first people Inge knew in St. Albert. And after them, the irascible Harry and his sweet wife Mary were a big fan of the Brown’s barbecues and parties. Maybe in the 70s, for a few years, there was also a group of traditional nuns, but they were not a good match with the Browns.

While in St Albert, despite a few ailments and broken bones, Inge benefitted from mostly fair health until cancer…breast cancer, anal cancer, bone cancer – and how she fought, with the support of so many friends and relatives… she largely beat the nasty thing but it did knock the stuffing out of her. Although she let nothing stop her from travelling to New York (after she was finished with the breast cancer) with a special assortment of friends including Barbara and her sister and her friend, as well as Joan Welch, where they took in concerts, operas and art museums.

From the 70s on, Inge worked her way up through the administrative ranks at the UofA, in three departments: Comparative Literature, English, Nursing and eventually, English again, after she retired. She loved her work and was absolutely in her hyper-organized element, using that super sharp memory, legendary charm and well-honed power of persuasion to balance precarious budgets, manage staff and revel in long dinner-table discussions regarding the actions and motives of her coworkers, for over 30 years. For most of her career she was strictly ‘Mrs. Brown’ in her proper, conservative way – not to be trifled with- and also relentlessly and unapologetically on time, or even early.

The English project she returned for, called the Orlando project, she counted as one of the most satisfying of her career since the subject matter was largely Jane Austen who Inge long adored.

Her great job gave her the chance to show off her great legs, lovely clothes, three languages and bold personality. She favoured smart suits in substantial fabrics with nicely tailored blouses and sharp pumps. In the style of her mother she liked a nice shirt waist dress and embroidered anything. And who could forget the perfection of her dark red nails and procession of perfectly sculpted, no-fuss hair cuts.

Many of Inge’s German relatives and friends visited her in Canada, especially in later years, bringing marvelous gifts and driving to the mountains with Inge and Des. Des brother Joe was not as much a visitor as a grand host. Over the years Des and Inge visited with him in UK several times. Joe was a colourful character, with a good mind and great flair for life. Inge was sometimes overwhelmed by his grandness and generosity of spirit, but she liked him well.

O how Inge travelled… not just to visit Joe, but with and to many of the people they met and befriended over the years, Canada – east to west – the United States, England, Ireland, Germany, Spain, France, Cypress, Mexico, Jamaica, Cuba, Hawaii, etc. etc. etc. In the late 80s Inge started saying ‘this will be my last trip to Germany.’ But she said it often, trip after trip… as she continued to travel for two decades.

Inge took a year break from the suits and the English Department to complete a BA with honours (she had already been taking single classes for a few years). It was a bit of an awakening, being at school again and she studied hard, with Ann and Des at the ready for endless consults. For her music class (one of the early courses) she and Ann set up in the living room, wine in hand, faced away from the record player and competed with each other to guess the symphony, concerto or composer. More happy days for Inge's memory bank. And her convocation was a big deal too. An excellent celebration. Horst and Ulla came from Essen. Friends, neighbours, children and grand children also attended. The house filled with flowers, food, music and laughter.

Over the four decades Inge resided at 58 she had six grandchildren. Pamela and her husband Brian had three successful, beautiful, blonde girls: Paula, Stephanie and Carolyn. Paula and Carolyn are married now too, with sweet little ones, making Inge a Great Grandmother. Elizabeth had a lithe, smart son, Desmond. r (Richard) had a marvelously musical boy called Dane who also has lovely children of his own and Karin had sweet sunny clever, Quinn.

Not so many people get most everything they want, but Inge did. From hard beginnings Inge rose and achieved her most important goals... career, education and educated company, music, travel, food, wine, fashion and great comfort. On balance, she succeeded handily.