A Cold Christmas Night: How My Grandfather Showed Me the World's Real Horrors.
I come from a large family, and I often reflect on the two grandfathers who, in very different ways, profoundly impacted my life and perspective.
My paternal grandad was, by all accounts, a tyrannical individual. He once even flung a dog into a ravine for barking too much. He lived through two wars, and it undeniably left its mark. I never met him, but I'm told he did what he could while clearly broken inside. His best act was giving my young dad money to start his own life. My dad, along with his siblings, did well, and I believe that brought my grandad some happiness.
But it was my maternal grandad who truly opened my eyes to the world, perhaps a bit too early, but for that, I am profoundly thankful. He was a rural man from the southern Peloponnese, "old as the hills" when I first remember him. His hands were rough and calloused from years of field work, yet they were incredibly kind, delighting in gently holding a toddler's hand. He was brusque, as rural folk can be, but his ways were kind, if stern.
I was about 12 when we visited for Christmas. I had a slight cold, and my mom had put me to bed by the fireplace for warmth. Grandpa offered to sit with me instead of going to church. So there we were, by the fire, with warm chamomile tea, him with his newspaper, and me with a kids' book on animal legends.
"Hey grandpa?" I asked, "Mom said you fought in the war. We’re covering that at school soon. Wanna tell me about it?"
I didn't know it then, but my innocent question opened a floodgate. It feels dramatic to say it now, but that's precisely how it felt. I understand now that my grandad spoke very little of his time in the army during WWII, likely due to a form of PTSD. He hadn't opened up to anyone—he told me more than he told his own adult children or older grandkids, all born after the war.
All of it was terrifying. Grandpa’s war wasn’t a glorious, heroic epic. It was a waking nightmare. He was a simple country man, a supply runner in charge of a team of mules and donkeys in southern Albania, on the initial Greco-Italian front. The first time he had to shoot somebody, he cried quietly for hours. He told me about the terrible weather, the suffering of the injured and ill, the chaos of ambushes, the terrifying despair of prisoners, and the sensory overload of it all. The stench of dying men and overworked mules. The din of gunfire and the howling of the mountain wind. He watched young soldiers, mere kids, die alone and cold.
Then the Germans arrived, bringing only more death, more horror. He fled, managing to return to Laconia almost on foot, alone and half-dead. He read about the famine in Athens from letters from his cousin. He lost three uncles and two cousins to executions and inter-fighting among guerrilla resistance forces. He saw men do horrible things.
Grandad’s stories taught me to be cautious of people very early on. He peeled back my child’s rose-tinted version of the world. He smashed those rose-tinted glasses. I think that’s when I stopped being totally innocent. That very cold Christmas night, grandpa told me the biggest horror story: about war and human depravity in the name of false ideas. He had to hold my hand through most of it.
"I’m nearing 100," he said, "and I still don’t understand why we had to go through that." He didn’t say it, but I believe he wanted me to know so I would be a better person than that. I truly hope that I am.
Παππού… μου λείπεις.
(Grandpa... I miss you.)
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I love this story, and cried for the old man. This story needed to be told. Peace & Love
#FamilyHistory #Grandfather #LifeLessons #WWII #Trauma #FamilyFirst
