the boy who said no

i’m eleven. everyone in my class is getting konfirmeret. everyone is talking about the party, the money, the gifts.

and i know — with something heavier than an eleven-year-old should feel — that i can’t do it. not because i hate god or want to make a scene. just because it would be a lie.

mor looked at me and said okay. she offered to throw a party anyway. a nonfirmation. and then daniel — daniel, who disagreed with me about everything — looked up and said he didn’t want to be confirmed either. just like that, we were in it together.

i was scared. not of god. of being the weird kid. the one who opted out. in vordingborg in the early 2000s, nobody did that. i did it anyway and let people think whatever they wanted.

it was the first time i chose what was true over what was easy. i think you’ve been doing some version of that ever since. sometimes it costs you.

don’t forget that kid. he was braver than he looked.

/ den lilleansen