The Man I Never Knew

I sit here with my grandad's old Bible, it's the one he had when he were in the war. I am not really interested in reading the Bible and I'm not really interested in the old things we have from the war either. I never knew my grandad, he was always there, but I didn't know him. He died a few years ago, he were the only granddad I could have known. They said he were damaged in the war, even though he had no physical problems to justify it, so when I were little I didn't really understand what they meant about that. He were a very quiet man, very serious and people often called him deep. My grandmother were very good with children, so I loved spending time with her, she was very outgoing, funny and childish. My granddad were like one of the old dusty objects that my grandmum moved around in the livingroom, they sat there and filled up their spots, but did nothing more. I were scared of my grandad, very scared. I knew there was something different about him, he were strange and peculiar in his own weird way. If he ever spoke, he would talk melancholic about the war, or about the dead dog he loved so much. I remember he often spoke in riddles, very soft and quiet and very often a silence turned up after he had spoken... On his old days he tried to kill himself with pills several times, old people often do these things they said. I dont know if he managed to do it, or if it were the long life that took him, I dont know if anyone know...

He wrote a lot, I am told that he were a very good writer. After his death, when I've gotten older I've read some of it, it made me feel the way I felt in his funeral. I didn't feel sad when he died and I never saw any tears on anyone in the funeral. Someone spoke about a man I couldn't understand were the same man that had been my grandad. He used to be different before the war they said. It was like this person had died a long time ago and I started to feel sad about not having known this person. I felt I never wanted to go to a funeral again, because I dont want to find out things about people when they are goon, things I should have known. It makes you think; where were I and why am I here?. My grandmother had cried a long time ago, because of my grandad and there were nothing warm about this funeral. I felt that way at least. I were born many many years after the war. Later on, after his death, I've always been curious about my grandad, probably because people that knew him, have always said that I remind them of him, probably because he were there and I never knew him. Now I sit here and read quotes, markes and cut outs that my grandad have put in this Bible. It smells old, just like all the things that is left of my grandparents.

My grandad didn't love the war, as many thought he did, I think he was very missunderstood. There is something behind all the military artifacts and medals he collected. I feel that way now, that I have read things he have written and when I think about the things I have been told about him. I read something he wrote about the war, a long time ago, I was too young to understand it then. He wrote that we should not forget the names on the memory stones they put up after the war. I've always thought a lot about that... Do we remember how to remember people?, do we understand how to respect them or do we just see them as names on a stone that we like to put flowers at?. How do we like to be remembered?... We still make wars and the most peaceful people of us, still belive violence can create peace... I think the memory stones are the graves of the lost respect for the simple individual. We bury the respect we should have given to the man that fights for a nation that never care about what exists inside the masses. Some die and some dont, but we admire them, give them fancy medals and sing for them. What does this mean?, when we never really look at what they lost and learn from it. There is a saying that says that the fight for the masses, is a fight for the individuals, but is it really?... I used to have a friend that were a supporter of Hitler, he would say that he didn't belive in the masses. Personally I dont think Hitler really belived in the masses either. Nazi Germany was build on a dream that one man showed to the masses. The simple individual is either forgotten in the masses or it leads the masses. This is politics and many people would say that it's not really interesting or it doesn't matter when it comes to the personal things, but when you look at how war and political changes affect people, we cant really say that this is true... I personally dont belive in the masses either, I dont think the fight for the individual is a lost one, it's just not one that is fought so often...

I wish to put some of the writing in my grandads war bible here, I translate just a few of the quotes. On the first page there is a name tag stamp that says; On his Majesty's service, written on the stamp is; This belongs to Kristian Jernstrøm. Then there is another stamp that says; Church Of Scotland. Under this it's written; on behalf of a friend of Norwegians, August 1940. Here are some of the small quotes that are written in the blank pages here and there.

He were like the shadow
of a big rock
in a dry land...

It felt painful to not have it
but I always hoped
that one day
I would find;
Gods condonable son
in the group of companions
so that I too
would finally win
my salvation and mercy reward...