Disciplinarian fathers

I just finished  the first book of Knausgaard life story – The Struggle. It was about his father. The book  is  brilliantly and painfully honestly written.  At least that is how the first book – Death in the Family - came across to me. Reading it I could find my own, old feelings about my father. About his heavy steps on the staircase, that immediately changed my mood from playful and light-hearted to watchful, scared and almost resentful. My father was a good hard working man who was a great role model for me and I am still thankful for some of my characteristics that I gained by osmosis observing him and his approach to life. So, why such a negative reaction when he  appeared in my peaceful and happy place. He loved me but I did not see it and did not understand that his love was not about kisses, hugs, smiles, softness or encouragement. He was responsible for the family and he took it very seriously. It seemed that it he never felt that he had done enough for us to relax and rest on his laurels.  He was straight to the point, a no nonsense person. A self made man, a bit rough at the edges but deep down sensitive. As a child I did not see the sensitive, loving side of his, I only saw that when he patted me on the shoulder I almost sat down on the floor, his caressing touch was so heavy. It almost hurt. I was afraid of him and tuned in to the sounds of home and its surrounding to recognise when he will be coming and I will have to change and present a protective and at the same time good girl demeanour.

When I think back to the times, I wish I could have a second round of my childhood. I would see my father in a different light and I would spend more time with him. Even if I remember him as a disciplinarian father, he never punished me. But I was still afraid of him and avoided his company. Sad and silly, really. So many missed opportunities for both of us.

Reading The Death in the Family I understood feelings of young Karl Ove. They were similar to my old feelings. The whole book is about the father and different chapters of his life. Many complexities and contradictions of the person are masterfully described. Still reading some reviews of the book there is typically a reference to a cruel and distant father. I read more into the father character. I saw a sensitive person as well as disciplinarian and indifferent father. There were times when he wanted to get close to his young son, share experiences with him. It did not work out. My father also wanted to spend time with me and we did have good times together. Like when he first taught me to ride a bicycle and some years later to ride his Russian huge and heavy motorbike IŻ. 

The motorbike looked something like this one. I get all mushy looking at it now and reminiscing my past a bike rider.

My father was  a very ingenious and dedicated teacher setting up motorbike on bricks in such a way that I could learn changing gears and operate most of the buttons with wheels spinning harmlessly in the air. In  the second stage of my “driving course”,  the motorbike was taken off the bricks. Father found a save place for me to practice and he let me loose. But he also held the motor bike to stop it with his force if I did something really silly.  It must have been physically demanding to run behind the motorbike holding it  in with me making all typical mistakes of uncontrollably speeding up or braking. Why didn’t I see that it was love he was giving me? On the strength of this education I got my driving licence at the age of 16 which was very unusual at the time in Poland. Thank you father.

My musing about disciplinarian fathers brought me to the point  that it is sometimes difficult to see beyond their harshness. Not a revelation? To me it is in a way.

There is going to be a sequel to this post. Or two. I want to explore my thought and feeling more.

Childhood revisited

The most happy memories of my childhood come from the times I spent with my grandparents in a Polish village in the eastern part of Poland. This part of the country is now called Poland B and that means representing lower standards than the prosperous districts. Place a bit behind the times.  My memories go to the times that are really far behind today. Sometimes I think that I have been living in three centuries. When I first visited my grandparents it was like going back in time to the XIXth century. There was no electricity there, water was drawn in buckets from a concrete well and I was taken from the station home to my grandparents by a horse and a buggy. No rubber wheels, just metal bands around the wooden wheels! It was a bumpy ride.

But the air was not polluted then. There were many pluses in those days at least in the eyes of the four-five years old girl. I was sent to my grandparents for many reasons, I presume. My mother was a really young woman, nineteen years older than myself. The grandmother performed the role of my carer perhaps better than my mother, she had more common sense and experience. My Beautiful Mother was also a working woman and she was away from home for most of the day. My parents were building a small business in the communistic Poland. They were considered to be enemies of the system and, at times, I felt guilty seeing that we were better off than most of the people around. I felt like I did not quite belong in the communistic world.

The official reason to send me away was – fresh air in Sadowne. Sadowne is the name of the village which has a big church and a big school. Much too big for the locals only. It also had its “upper class”. My grandmother was a kindergarten/school teacher in her unmarried times and my grandfather was a Polish-Soviet war hero and a tailor.  They were respectable people. I say it with tongue in cheek. Of course they were respectable but so were the others as well. Anyhow I was not supposed to be familiar with some of the neighbours. Some  were even considered to be a bad influence.

The neighbours on the right side did not meet with approval of my grandmother. There were many children there who were not clean and ran around bare foot. Not proper people according to my grandma. The father of the family used to drink too much and when under influence loudly disciplined his wife and children. One could hear shouts and screams coming from their house.  With time the boys of the family became strong enough to stop excesses of their father. The dramas became less frequent.

People who lived in the main street were not farmers, they were teachers, shop keepers, tailors. The right side neighbours were farmers. During harvest I could observe strange and fascinating activities like threshing wheat and haymaking. I was transfixed to the fence dividing the two houses looking at the magic of what was happening on the other side. It was all new to me. This was the only time I saw harvest work except for later on in movies about life in the nineteenth century.
   
                                   

One day I sneaked in to the neighbours through the gate in the dividing fence. The gate was not used often as there were no friendly visits between the two families.  However I can imagine that my naughty grandpa when he wanted to smoke a forbidden cigarette, he would cross the gate to go to the neighbour for a smoko.

Once I ventured into the forbidden territory to be warmly welcome and given a treat – big slice of dark bread, covered with glistening lard spiked with cracklings and sugar sprinkled on top. Revolting? Perhaps. But not too my taste at the time. It was heavenly good, a completely new, exciting taste. And a forbidden fruit! The bliss did not last long. I was not clever enough to hide my tressure and eat it in private. With my original sandwich in hand, I marched in to the kitchen of my grandma who seized it immediately and threw it to the rubbish bin with disgust. Oh, what a disappointment to the little girl! Such a fantastic food and so rudely taken away! Perhaps I will not ever be able to taste anything as good as that! Of course I have tasted many fantastic food after this event, like the oysters in Paris, I wrote about earlier. Or bread dunked in fragrant olive oil at Santo Spirito. This black bread with lard belongs however to the list of best food I tasted in my life. Actually some form of that specialty is now served in Polish folk restaurants, only the bread is not dark enough and there is no sugar served with it.

This was served while waiting for lunch with my Aussie friend when she visited Gdansk this year.

 In my dreamy plans I see myself someday visiting Sadowne again. This most likely will remain only a dream. But who knows?