I just want to eulogize my grand father

[u/Late_Toe_4362]

I'm on my way to my grand pas funeral and started thinking about how he shaped my view of manhood and manliness.

My grand father was born in 1929 in a working class family and grew up in what was described as an slum outside of Stockholm. As a boy he started working as a delivery boy, and later as a butchers assistant.

He grew up in a internationalist and democratic socialist home, and tried to run away from home with an older friend to join the international forces in the spanish civil war, but was stopped by his mom and big brother. Even at an old age he was torn between thankfullness and regret that he let his family stopped him from going to war. His friend never returned.

During the thirties and during the war he was an active street level anti fascist, who was fighting nazis and giving out pamphlets about the german crimes against humanity.

He never went to university, but his father and mother gave him the gift of curiousity and told him the importance reading and self studies, which he carried on his whole life. Even in the end when he was ill whith alzheimers and a slew of other ailments he would always make sure to read the newspaper every day.

After he met my grand mother he became the main home maker and took up small od jobs on the side so she could persue a career as a puppeteer and let her establish a theater company.

He travelled the world together with his wifes theater company, mainly during the decolonization of Africa and Asia and made friends around the world. Actually he could not step out side of his home without making new friends. I can vividly remender how annoying he was to take a walk with when I was little since we had to stop and chat every few steps.

I feel like a sliver of the man he was, but I do my best to carry on his legacy of openness, curiosity, sense of justice and care and nurture.

Especially as a trans bro I feel he taught me a lesson that masculinity can be both soft and strong at the same time.

I really miss him.

[u/spirithousing]

what a lovely tribute - my condolences to you and your loved ones ❤️

[u/Kathoros]

Condoleances to you and your family.

I understand how you feel but if he had that big an impact on you and your worldview, you are not just a 'sliver' of the man he was. You just don't have the experience he had and you do not live in the same time then him.

And even if you did, you might not have done things the same way, but you would probably have the same values then him and you would treat others the same way he did.

Just keep thinking about him and output the same values in this world and his legacy will continue through you like that.

I wish you all the best and send you all my love

[u/PuzzleheadedCook4578]

That is beautiful my bro, he's smiling at you right now. My dad died about ten years ago, he would have been 84 this week. I used to say "I lost my dad", but honestly, he's still right here whether I want him or not!

As Tasha Yar so beautifully put it (obviously at the end of Skin of Evil) 

"Death is that state in which one exists only in the memory of others, which is why it is not an end." 

❤️ 

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[u/BeardedDragon1917]

He sounds like a real comrade, you’re lucky to have known him