My grandmother Louise was an admirable hardworking and loyal woman – to my grandfather and to her family and her friends. Throughout her life she was the \u201cthe hub\u201d for the family – always concerned and interested in everyone’s whereabouts and how our days where. A daily call on to everyone of her 3 children on the telephone was the routine, keeping up with everyone – and also informing everyone about everyone.<\/p>\n
After retiring as shop assistant, and moving in her later years from the house that they she and my grandfather had lived in for a life time – to a larger apartment establishment, she dedicated much her time to the people around her. She was not very outgoing or particular active in the local community as such – politically or culturally. But for 5-6 close neighbors, that she came to know well. She was very dedicated in helping them in their everyday life – particularly those that were weaker than her or the once became sick over the years. She was a force in this tiny community till she herself was to weak to support others.<\/p>\n
As her grandchild these neighbors where almost an extended familiy. You would hear about them what they did if they had gone on an exciting news, if they have had a visit from their family, if they have had a birthday etc. etc.<\/p>\n
Their friendship was to a large extend constituted by these social bonds and what they did was – giving and taking \u2013 helping each other out. My Grandmother in particular would bring the daily newspaper and weekly magazines around to everyone – as kind of a postman would do – she would organize washing of clothing between the others and shopping was coordinated throughout the daily routine of visiting them all for a short chit chat. Obviously drinking morning coffee and a homebaked cookie throughout the day, was the cornerstone of the daily routines, and the exchange of gossip. I suspect that my grandmother also got some favors in exchange for her daily tour of the house with newspaper and laundry – but the overall purpose was not what she could \u201ctake\u201d but rather what giving gave her.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My grandmother Louise was an admirable hardworking and loyal woman – to my grandfather and to her family and her friends. Throughout her life she was the \u201cthe hub\u201d for … Continue reading Not what she could take, but what giving gave her<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stories"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=924"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/924\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogit.itu.dk\/givetake\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}