LETTER TO CHRISTINE

2 June 2007

Dear Christine,

Thank you for your letter and DVD, ‘ABBA The Definitive Collection’, it was most thoughtful. My, you do have some tricky questions, I will do my best to answer but for some there is simply no answer to give.

Unfortunately life isn’t in simple black and white, and another fact of life is that you don’t get answers or understanding with age, the years just work to pile more and more questions against a door that you open at your own peril. Still at 18 you have plenty of time to encounter all that sort of rubbish, for the moment you should be looking to do nothing more than to enjoy the ride.

Yes, I understand that some of the Mucky Ducks Fan Club are a bit angry that Frida Lyngstad (or whatever her name now is) never acknowledged the copy of the book she was sent – but there again, it should not be a surprise, or blown out of proportion; believe me when I say that it hasn’t in anyway upset me. Nobody should get angry, it serves no purpose; you must understand that Red and Frida might have had the same face but there the similarity ends. Although I have never met Frida, I can appreciate that she is her own woman the same as Red was hers; to mix them together would be a huge mistake and an injustice to both women.

Again yes, Red did once say that if anything happened to her she would be ‘pleased’ if I told Frida her story; I have no factual reasons as to why it was important to her but can make a guess or two. Red always got so angry when mistaken for Frida, this happened a lot in the early days, but I believe she secretly got a bit of a chuckle out of it. Plus, I guess, there was a bit of jealousy involved, Frida got the fame and fortune and Red got eight scruffy seamen as companions - that does seem a bit of an imbalance. However, a life is never what it seems when looking from outside the window; I am willing to bet Frida had her own problems, both large and small. I have tried on two occasions to carry out Red’s wish but in this I failed miserably and there will be no third attempt. After all what can I say after so many years, it would be an elderly man telling elderly woman a story that, in the small picture, has nothing to do with her life?

Unfortunately I won’t be able to come to a club meeting in the near future as in a few days I have to return to hospital for some more fiddling. This time they are playing with the pulmonary artery and I believe it’s a bit tricky. So, for the moment I will have to pass, however, I shall take the DVD and a portable player along to the hospital with me, I think it will be grand thing to watch and listen to while recovering.

As to your second to last question, well all I can do is quote something I said in another letter.

Every life has a central core, a time that, once over, will never be repeated. It will be your segment in time, the one you look back on and say, “That was my time; that was when I was alive”. It may last five years, ten years or even twenty five years, perhaps it will only last for one night, the time is irrelevant. It will belong to you alone and for the rest of your life you will nurture the memory, at times with laughter and at times with tears: both are equally valuable in making you all that you will become. This special time is not recalled simply through a memory, there is an ache, a feeling in the heart and that accompanies it and makes you gasp for breath, this is what makes it so very unique and personal.
I was one of the lucky ones; my segment in time is not really about an event or even events, it combines, friendship, adversity and loss but more importantly it is embraced by laughter, music, colour and strongest of all, love, never underestimate love.

Sorry but that’s about as close as I can get to it, my skills aren’t sufficient to explain any further. You will know when it happens – not at the time – but in later years, suddenly you will get ‘the feeling’. Having said that, you mentioned how wonderful it must be to have such memories. Yes it is, however first you have to live a life that naturally creates memories and for this you sometimes have to step outside the box and that can sometimes have a high emotional price tag. Plus, I don’t believe it’s possible to deliberately create memories, I think it just has to happen.

And so to your last question, my favorite ABBA song, actually this isn’t as tricky as you would think.
It would be logical for me to say ‘I Let The Music Speak’. As that was the Song Of The Ducks. But although that comes in at second, my number one is ‘When All Is said And Done’. It speaks to me of all that was, what was gained, what was lost, and the inference that the ride was worth everything.

My body is telling me that my time is drawing to a close and that's OK as I think I have encountered, embraced and thrilled at living just about the full spectrum of events and emotions. So my young friend go and live your life. 18 to 30 are magical years; all is yours to command, so make the most of it. These twelve short years can fly in an instant, don’t waste one precious second, you never get them back again ... except, perhaps, in a special memory.

Your Friend

Harry

HOME