Meeting her grandfather after his death was a disturbing reality. Suddenly, her day turned into a deception. It was not a figment of imagination that her present would metamorphose from the past in a form of a skeleton. His remains were being transferred while his bones were going to contact light just to encounter her. Even for a brief moment. The more she thought about the encounter the more her fear dominated over her mind. She couldn’t help it but feel strange while introducing herself in front of her grandfather’s grave for the first time. The encounter was epic to her. How strange to have to meet death in its glorious beauty.
Her grandfather had died before she was born. She knew little about him. The vacuum time was occupied with imagination. To her surprise, there was more to the story. If only she could have known the pain, maybe would have been easy for her to understand such encounter. His existence had deep roots only in her mother’s heart.
She felt trapped between the fear and obsession of unknown. Her family life felt more as an untold secret. After all these years his bones were disturbed from a long time of hibernation. Suddenly the present revealed the unknown past. Although her parent’s memories were still vivid in her heart, yet she was clueless if there was any family affair or memory about her grandfather after all these years. The only connection she had about her grandfather was the letter her cousin sent, whom she never met, inviting her back in her grandfather’s country for a family affair.
She knew her mother had longed to go back, although, ironically she had played with the idea as if it was a prohibited love. Herself, she never visited such a place. Through her mothers’ stories, she believed that in that place every family breaded heroes. Alexander the Great was their admirer, the Greek traded with them, the Romans neighbored them, while the clear waters enchanted them, and the mountains fathered them. Such history was resonated in the form of the chant traveling and echoing through the air and getting lost sometimes within the path of the fresh water.
There she was, looking while others began unearthing his bones. It seemed to her that even he wanted to present himself to her in a glorious manner. Her imagination and reality melted into one another. His bones looked so cold and yet so precious and near to her heart. They revealed themselves in a pure white, resisting time, and deceiving darkness. At that moment all her awkwardness disappeared. She requested to hold his skull for a brief moment. He had a fine skull that was refined by sharp edges. Her memory recalled her medicine studies for a moment but by far this was the most beautiful observation she ever did. Unconsciously she associated his features with herself. The overwhelming moment was influenced by his presence. She was grateful to him for such encounter.
She rolled the skull in her hands carefully observing every piece of surviving cranium surface. Her fingers slid slowly caressing the surface and feeling the soft texture. The more she observed the more she discovered his past. His skull slowly revealed his story. The frontal lobe was severally damaged with a distingue crack. Her fingers felt it all, even the exit wound. The story revealed itself necked in a form of bones. It was that moment that she realized why she never met him, and why even her mother didn’t remember him. Her mother must have been too young, roughly four years old. Bones told it all, they didn’t lie. His grave revealed an old war history and his skull revealed a cruel Nazi execution. It was the winter of 1943. Her grandfather’s bones finally spoke. The narrative was etched in his skull. After all, he was not a stranger to her anymore.
