My mother was born in 1938 in Aarhus, Denmark. She had a brother, John, who was 1½ years older than she is. They grew up in the area around Skanderborgvej in Aarhus. During his birth John had damaged his brain. My mother often took care of her older brother John. John regularly tore up my mother's books and often wanted my mother's attention, so it was difficult for my mother to do any homework. Not least due to fear of what her brother and her father might do, my mother did not have the courage to invite a friend home from school. So at Læssøesgade school, she did not seek friends and often felt alone.

My mother also spent much time with her father's sister, Anna, and her husband, Harald, who lived at Sejrs Allé in Risskov North of Aarhus. Anna and Harald offered to my mother's parents to adopt my mother because they experienced that my mother was being held back in her own development by taking care of her mentally ill brother John. My mother mentioned that when she was around 11 years old, her aunt Anna would sometimes accompany her to a French cooking school at Park Allé in Aarhus, so my mother could have a break from her brother. Later, Anna would pick up my mother again. This was a 3 week event where my mother attended the school 3 days a week. My mother believes that this was an important experience that helped her love cooking. My mother's aunt Anna also went with my mother to a place called "Molskroen", where they stayed for 3 weeks to learn about good manners.

As a child, my mother attended - with other girls - Læssøesgade school. At that time, key values in education were a strong degree of discipline and punishment for making mistakes. For example, if a student laughed in class, he or she had to leave the classroom. And if a student talked when standing in lines in the school yard, a teacher would hit the student with a stick. For my mother's father, discipline was of strong importance. He wanted her daughter to to have top grades in "behaviour" all the time. She obeyed his wish and frequently got top marks in "behaviour". As my mother once got the next highest mark in "behaviour", her father got angry and refused to sign the report card.

Due to my mother's strong dissatisfaction with school, she wanted to do something else, learn in different ways, work with different people in a different environment. So in 1953, my mother's father, Robert, found an apprenticeship position for her at Jensen Skorup, a tailoring company based in Aarhus, Denmark. The company employed about 150 tailors and made uniforms for people working for the police, postal services, telecommunications companies, and transportation service companies. Compared with Læssøesgade school, my mother felt much more at home in this environment. She liked that people needed what she did and thrived with the responsibility she got in her work. As a consequence, she learned much better and faster than at school. During the 12 years my mother worked for the company, she helped out with accounting services as well as the procurement of clothing materials from, for example, Japan and France.

Later in her life, my mother worked for the dentist school in Aarhus, a school that became a part of Aarhus University. In a career which spanned several decades, my mother worked on a large variety of tasks servicing both patients, dentist students, employees, and managers. For example, she bought gold and silver in the Netherlands and sold the gold and silver to dentist students. She also bought skulls in India, which she rented out to dentist students. Among other tasks my mother solved were accountancy work, sending and receiving mail, writing meeting summaries, archiving information, registering patients as well as connecting patients with dentist students and/or other people they needed help from.

Throughout her life, my mother invited friends over to her home at Elstedhøj in Lystrup North of Aarhus for a meal and a chat. Cooking a meal and serving it on a beautifully decorated table, she liked to serve people as well as communicate and connect with people to make her guests happy. 

Communication and connection 

• Over many years, my mother liked to listen to radio programs such as  P4 Aarhus during which people talk about their lives. She also enjoyed going by bus from her home in Lystrup to Aarhus. She liked to watch life happen. On her way, she shared smiles and chats with people she met. For example, she enjoyed communicating with bus drivers, employees in supermarkets, and/or with other people she met as she moved from a to b. 

• My mother shared stories from her life, which are published at Aarhus public library as well as at Aarhus arkivet.

• With classmates she had at Læssøesgade school in the 1940s and 1950s, she organized events during which they reengaged with students and teachers to learn about the changes happening in the way education is done - for example regarding the use of social media as well as regarding changes in what educators and students do. 

• My mother likes to share observations, stories, and thoughts about life using social media. She uses, for example, facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Skype, WhatsApp, and LinkedIn. 

• My mother explained that over time she has become less extroverted and more introverted. Increasingly, she likes to have time for herself to, for example, observe nature and think.

Experimentation  

My mother liked to learn how cooks prepare various meal, for example by watching Go' on television as well as reading about food and cooking. She likes to try out recipes she learns about and also likes to try out new things. Also, during a European capital of culture event in Aarhus, Denmark she helped paint miniature viking ships.

Beauty

My mother loves beautiful flowers - especially flowers that are white and purple. She also likes beautiful clothes. My mother likes to watch what members of royal families around the world are doing. Over many years, my mother enjoyed watching television programs in which beautiful scenery and animal life from around the world are displayed. Examples are Tour de France and concerts initiated by André Rieu.  

Safety

• When my mother was 6 years old, her father and 2,000 other police officers in Denmark were taken away from their families and brought to concentration camps in Germany. Due to negative emotions such as fear and shame, my grandfather had difficulty communicating about experiences, thoughts and emotions, he had. My mother told me that she, herself, felt strong fear of what she had experienced during time.

• When my mother and father divorced in 1975, she felt lots of fear. Among questions she posed to herself was the question "Will I make it?"

• My mother's car was stolen several times. This created lots of fear in her heart. Because of the fear, she felt, she put bells on the front door, so she could hear if someone broke into her apartment. She also put chairs behind the door in case someone would break into her apartment.

• A couple of times my mother fell down on the ground and hurt herself. This created fear in her heart.

• Over many years my mother had a habit of keeping things such as food, things used for cooking, as well as clothes. I learned that this habit of collecting goes back to her childhood in the 1940s, when things were scarce.