stopping at Shell on your way to war

Out of some forgotten drawer, a postcard turned up.

The black-and-white picture on the front: an insignificant Finnish town in late Thirties or early Forties. Ancient cars, some unassuming buildings and  - of all things - a Shell petrol station (probably the hottest thing in town at the time).

The card is stamped "field post", which means it was sent from the battlefront during World War II. But what fascinates me most is that it was written by my grandfather to his son, my father. My grandfather whom I barely remember. The only real memento I have of him is an old violin - he used to play at wedding parties and such, until he found religion, which apparently put a stop to all that. Nobody else in the family played the fiddle. My father inherited it after his death and hung it on the wall - maybe just looking at it gave him some comfort.

I have never seen this handwriting before. I stare at it, bewitched. The ornamental curls in the capital N of our last name. I have never felt such significance in that name before. The father of my father wrote it as his own, sitting on some rickety train on his way back to the nightmares of war after a brief furlough at home. Still young but already a veteran. Already knowing what it's like to cower in the trenches under such heavy fire that you're convinced it's your last day on earth.

So when the train pauses in a tiny town, he gets off to buy a postcard to send home. The things he writes to his young son are generic and easy-going. "On my way there" to wherever he is going. "Hoping to be home soon." I can almost feel the pain behind this, leaving his wife and several children to fend for themselves on the farm, not knowing if he will actually make it back.

And the phrase "gud skydde oss alla". God protect us all.

I cried over this postcard. I'm going to start writing my last name with that curl in the N.