English translation of the 12 “memory plates”

My sister and I were at our fathers’ workshop a hot summer day. Dressed in bikini, we were standing in a dark corner of the workshop. We pumped oil from a large barrel, and smeared the oil on ourselves, until we were completely covered. When our father was reminded of the story, he said ”Yes, that was the time when you turned into two little colored girls”.


As a child I believed that there had to be little people living in the radio.


I often went around with a towel over my head, imagining it was long hair. My mother remembers that I also wore it when we had guests, and I swung it around a lot.


My sister and I often played with clay on the flagstones around our parent’s house. We dug up the clay ourselves, and added water to it, if needed. We messed up all of the flagstones.


I had a habit of sitting on the back of some of our farm animals. I remember trying to sit on a cow, a pig and a sheep. Every time they stood up, but I hung on, and the sheep and the pig ran with me on their back, until I fell off.


The neighbors’ three older boys named Kim, Bent & Ole were visiting us, and we were playing. The boys suggested that my sister and I should lie down on the ground, and the boys should pretend to be blankets, and therefore lie on top of us.


On the school bus my friend and I took turns making up a story about the bus being our home, and we talked about how the furniture would be, and where we would go. At some point we also made a lot of drawings about some rabbits, and their homes under the ground.


Dorte and I were scouts, and we regularly were in church with the other scouts. At one of the services, Dorte and I sat closely, hugging each other. I remember we were told that that was not a way to behave in a church.


When we lived in no.22, we had some birch trees in our garden. My sister and I got the idea to use our mothers’ brand new red lipstick to write on the white bark on the trees. My sister also remembers that we smeared our red swing with toothpaste


My sister clearly remembers the little red oil can our father had in his workshop, and the fact that there often was oil at places where there shouldn’t be.


My sister and I found a branch, or some old pottery. We imagined that our finds were belonging to a witch living with Sofus, who lived close to the drugstore.


I remember that our uncle Eric often drove by on Sundays, as he was driving around selling bread. Sometimes our cousins came with him, and then they stayed to play with us. Eric gave us some cookies which he called “small weenies”. Sometimes our mother baked pancakes for us.