2023-06-14 10:22:03
Others think Nico resembles his father, but what does he think of this himself?
I published eleven years ago Never been sick, a book about my father. A friend of my father’s told my brother ‘I’d be in big trouble if I ran into him’. I was seen by a large group of my father’s acquaintances as someone who had disrupted the party. I was not thanked for publishing the book when my father with Alzheimer’s was in a closed ward. I’ve read a lot from the book over the last ten years, but always the same passages. A story about my father at a flea market, an anecdote about a holiday and his sudden presence at a performance of my band.
Only a few weeks ago I read the whole book again and I was shocked by the last forty pages. It’s an inky ending. I describe the endless quarrels between my parents and the desperation I see in my father when he no longer understands his car. The insults from my mother, who can’t seem to see what’s going on with my father.
Apparently something has changed in those eleven years. I first noticed that when I was at Bram’s funeral a year ago. He was a good friend of my father and mother. I listened to Loes, his wife and Edwin, their son and my friend. He spoke. I didn’t do that at my father’s funeral. After the funeral I walked to Loes to offer her my condolences. She looked at me and started laughing. She said, “You’re not going to like what I’m about to say at all, but my God, Nico, you look just like your father. As if Klaas is standing in front of me.”
I’ve thought a lot about the phrase. “You won’t like it.” I had felt a certain pride when Loes said it. I look like my father. I am his son and he is in me whether I like it or not. It’s only now that I understand why I started wearing baseball caps six months ago. My father had one on his head fourteen hours a day for sixty years.
The day before yesterday I walked past a shop window and was shocked by the reflection. Same walk, same beard. It feels like my father is slowly but surely creeping into my body from the afterlife. I do not mind. Not anymore.
Nico Dijkshoorn (62) lives with Tanja, has two children from a previous relationship and has a very personal view of the world.
#walked #shop #window #shocked #reflection