My father was a complicated man. His early life was framed by loss and this followed him forever. When he was 8 years old, his family fled Nazi Germany to Sweden. And his life was forever changed. The stories I share are from my father’s viewpoint, coloured by his perspective as a child. Of course, there was likely discussion among the adults, but my father was not privy to it.
My grandfather, having seen the proverbial writing on the wall, put his small family on a train to Sweden for a holiday, and they simply never went back. They lost everything. My father’s first years were marked by the presence of servants: a nanny, a cook, a maid. My grandmother was suddenly in a strange land with nothing, unprepared for the life that was now theirs. My father told me that he often heard his mother crying when she thought she was alone. My grandfather had lost his business and was struggling to support his family. Tensions were high. Although much of my grandfather’s family followed to Sweden, much of my grandmother’s family remained in Germany, including her mother, who subsequently died in Theresienstadt concentration camp.
In the early part of the 20th century, children were not seen as being sensitive to trauma or in need of support. They were simply expected to soldier on, to be seen and not heard, to never ask questions. When my father arrived in Sweden, antisemitism was rampant. School was not easy. Life was not easy. My father was a refugee of war. An immigrant. An outsider. And that feeling would be ingrained in him for the rest of his life.
No matter where he lived, what he did or how successful he was, inside himself my father remained an 8 year old Jewish refugee for the rest of his life.
No comments:
Post a Comment