Roots #1

I remember from stories that my grandmother’s very first husband served in the Second World War and he died in action. The second husband was my grandfather. He also served in the war but he got home and as a disabled soldier he married my grandmother. He was very silent. He went to the local pub or the shop every day and bought a box of beer, then went home if not stay at the pub then just sat down and drank the whole box. My mother often told me that he did not really speak to anyone. He was alienated and always alone. Drinking and thinking. Some said it was because of the things he saw in the war were too vicious he was never be able to process them completely and alcohol was a way to run away from the harsh reality he had to face in the war. 

Although he was dinking heavily he was not a violent or loud alcoholic. He just sat down, drank, thought and then went to bed and fell asleep. 

I think that one of the reasons why I was always fascinated and somehow addicted to the Second World War was because I am coming from a military family and my other grandfather was also wrecked by the war physically and mentally. It is something that people, especially men, don’t talk about: the fear, the depression, the heaviness they carry from the past experiences and the inhuman events they had to go through. Especially those who served in the war. 

It’s extremely hard to understand how human lives have no value when it comes to war, business and politics. 

It is sad that most of the people were not able to communicate because it was something people should not talk about. So they buried the tremendous experiences within themselves. 

I remember when I was a kid my father got home almost every other day with the news that somebody hanged themself. Back then I did not know what suicide was or why do people do things like that. Most of them were men. They were unhappy, depressed, aimlessly looking for a way to get out of the village which was separated from social webs. Men were lonely and isolated. They drank, they had casual sex, sometimes they channelled their anger with other things… 

I don’t think that these things are things that anybody could ever understand. The only thing that can help ease the pain is expression via communication or writing. I believe that is why my grandfather engaged in writing letters to their relatives who moved away from the tiny village or ran away from the country in order to save themselves. It was like a bomb exploding in the middle of a crowd and people hit the concrete wherever they could and tried starting anew. 

I think about a lot what it was like during the war. Serving in the war. Living those things and not being able to talk about them. Being a man and being extremely unhappy and in distress. And there are so many unanswered questions, broken pieces, lost family members. To think that there are wars still going on around the globe is just scary. For many people these things are going on on repeat while we are going shopping for fancy clothes, eating out and binge watching our favorite soap operas, people out there are dying and serving a country might not even be worth serving for…

In memoriam:
I.D.