Background, lyrics and more

About  my dad
 

My dad (born in 1926) grew up on the danish island of Als together with a big sister and a smaller brother. His parents – especially his mother – didn't waste many occassions telling him he was a useless idiot.

That attitude towards children was probably more common back then, but that doesn't make it less painful and traumatizing.

Shortly before he passed away, I visited him in Flensburg, Germany where he lived at an old peoples home. Even then – at 78 – it tormented him never to have received the accept and love from his parents, and staring with empty eyes he said: ”I never understood why my mother always criticized me”. The word ”love” what not in his vocabulary, but that was what he meant.

And it wasn't because he was neither stupid, in lack of initiative or didn't achieve what he set out for. Eg. he probably was the first person to carry out sabotage against the germans during WWII.

April 9th 1940 -  the very day the german army occupied Denmark - he found an unmanned german tank on a road not far from his home. Immediately he ran home, got a hammer, and smashed everything he could down in the cockpit.

It was probably neither due to moral or political rage that made him act so resolutely. It was rather an opportunity to unpunished (he thought) smash some inventory, and maybe at last get some credit from his parents. But what he got was scolding and a slap in his face.
 

Later both he and his parents joined the resistance. He, among other things, carried out reconnaissance tasks and smuggled weapons. His parents home was a secret communication centre and a hideout for people on the run from the germans.
All three were revealed by a danish snitch. My granddad was sent to concentrationcamp Neuengamme and returned with the “white busses” (red cross) weighing about 50 kilo (110 pounds). My grandmother was released because a doctor-friend of hers told the germans that she had a deadly and highly contagious disease (which made the germans lose interest in having her around). My dad was warned in time and went underground until the liberation in 1945, 18 years old.

My grandparents basically communicated by shouting at each other (and many others). One of them would say eg.: “it's raining”, to which the other would angrily reply “no it's not” !. Thus the platform for the entertainment of the afternoon was established. Going outside to check outside, was seen as cheating, and would destroy the good ambience.

Shouting at others, in other words, was “the normal” for my dad. That was what he knew and what he was used to daily, and at the same time you avoided, in any substational way, to reflect on other people, not mentioning – yourself.

My dad also had a habbit of throwing a mental handgrenade by shouting out loud if things got “too cozy” - it was highly effective.

At the same time he had a very good sense of humor and could be very funny and lively among old friends, neighbours or total strangers. But at home he often retreated to his “safe zone” of conflict.
He didn't have good experiences showing what he felt. It was seen as “weak” – probably also a sign of the time.
 

But there were also nice and positive things about him, and in different ways he tried to change the way we kids were affected by his own upbringing, so we shouldn't pass it on to his grandchildren.
He succeeded in telling us that we DID matter, that we WERE got at things, and he was actually able to hug us now and then – stiff as a tree, but still - which is pretty amazing, seen in relation to his own experiences.

One day he told me ”don't follow my path”. He didn't specify it further, but it was an apparent ”letter of freedom”, advising me to follow my own path. In that way he gave me a platform from where I could break the ”family curse”.

​

That was  important - and loving.