Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once wrote, “Letters are among the most significant memorial a person can leave behind them.” If I can make a judgement from this comment alone, my parents, especially my father, left me a very substantial way to remember them. The tub in the photo only holds
If I could turn back time… I would go back to the time just before I was born. Those couple of months just before the birth of their first, and ultimately only, child when my parents were presumably discussing how they would bring me up. I would try to infiltrate
The early years of the 20th century seem to have promoted conflict in a number of countries, especially in Europe. As I’m typing this, I am travelling on a train from Belfast to Dublin, having spent a couple of interesting days in what is still a walled city. My first
“A man does what he must,” begins a quote by Winston Churchill. Remembering my father’s stories, those six words seem to sum up his life. He lived much of his younger days hemmed in by rules and regulations, mostly unwritten, but always inflexible. He was brought up by his father
When I closed the door for the last time to my father’s house, I took with me boxes of documents, certificates, letters and bits of paper with scribbles on them. Most of these were either in German or Russian. I can order a coffee in German. I can count to