CAPTAIN COPENHAGEN

Captain Copenhagen tells the story of Helen and her daughter Leonie. After Leonie is diagnosed with depression at 14 years old, Helen decides that they need to move to the country that has been attributed as one of the happiest in the world, Denmark. Her hope is that she can use the country, culture and everything Danish to “cure” her daughter and make her happy again. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple.

This blog is a work of fiction. It includes comedic episodes from Helen’s perspective as she tries to navigate Danish life, and more subdued episodes from Leonie’s perspective as she tries to navigate her mother.

All episodes can be found at www.captaincopenhagen.co.uk.

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TRIGGER WARNING: Captain Copenhagen explores the topic of mental health.

The Tourists

Helen, Mother

It was the first day of Leonie’s school summer holiday. And I mean the absolute first day.

Finished school on Friday. It’s Saturday morning. Holiday starts, fun begins.

It was time to be a tourist.

I wanted to show Leonie everything that Copenhagen had to offer, the things that people traveled here to see. I would let Denmark work its magic by going to the source and letting her experience some of its history.

As we stood looking up at the Round Tower I knew this was a good idea. The sun had just come out and there was no queue.

It was a little before opening time. Just a little. An hour. I had left enough time so we could walk here and avoid the dreaded S-Train, plus a bit more time to make sure that we were front of the queue, plus a bit more to buy ourselves something for lunch and something to drink, plus a little bit to make sure we could negotiate the weather and… I may have left too much time.

But I didn’t want to miss out on this. The Round Tower was perfect. Absolutely perfect. A view of the whole city. Give Leonie a chance to get a view on her new home, her new life, and really take it all in.

Don’t get me wrong, the ‘Helen steps back and doesn’t get involved plan’ was still valid. I would simply walk to the top with her, enjoy the ascent together, and then leave her to enjoy the view and make my way back down. Return to the earth where Mother Nature intended me to be.

It was all because of the plan.

Nothing at all to do with my fear of heights.

None whatsoever.

Looking up at the tower this all felt right, my perfectly orchestrated plan would run just as that, perfectly.

I repeat.

Per-fect-ly.

‘Greetings’.

I slowly lowered my head, and I cannot exaggerate just how slowly. I regressed to the infantile state of believing that anything I don’t see doesn’t exist. Or to put it scientifically, the ‘lalalalalala, I can’t hear you’, approach.

Flo. The Flo from the art club. Why was she here? I was aware of how scrunched up and displeased my face was. I didn’t want her there.

‘Don’t worry. I’ve said hello, and now I will leave.’ She may have sensed it.

I’m happy that Leonie was meeting new people, but I just wasn’t sure about Flo. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why.

‘Enjoy your morning of overhyped tourism, exposure to which will slowly chip away at your soul as your expectations for life sink lower and lower.’

That was why.

‘Excuse me,’ I replied. She was leaving, I shouldn’t have started, but I couldn’t help myself.

‘We’re here to enjoy the wonder of the Round Tower’, I defended my new towered friend in all its glory.

‘Wonder?’ she questioned. Actually questioned. How dare she.

First, there were absolutely no stairs. The whole thing was ramped, like a Helter-Skelter, except I probably wouldn’t get away with sliding down it. Perfect for wheelchairs, small children, and middle aged British women with arthritis in their knees.

Second, it was well and truly caged in. I mean, really, super caged in with railings as high as the sky. I think if I managed to find some way to fall off this tower I wouldn’t be upset as much as impressed.

Third, these two things were so wondrous it was so easy to articulate the tower’s greatness.

‘Well…’ I started, ‘it’s wondrous, it’s a tower and it’s… it’s…’

‘Round?’

‘It is a wonderful piece of Copenhagen history that gives us a fantastic view of the whole city and a true Danish experience!’

Leonie just stood there in the middle of us. The uneasy hole in our Donut of Disagreement.

‘Ja ja. Sure sure. I could show you something that would give you a real experience if you want?’ Flo proposed, with eyes that I didn’t 100% trust.

And off she started walking.

I would not follow her, I would not get bated in.

But Leonie started to follow her.

Was she on autopilot? Or did she really want to go with Flo? Did she not want to visit the tower that was oh so safe, oh so wondrous, and oh so round? I really couldn’t tell. She had been a little out of it today. But, if there was something else she was enthusiastic about seeing that was great. But…

But…

She suddenly stopped in her tracks, in a little world of her own and turned back to me.

‘What do you want to do, mum?’

…

Vor Frelsers Kirke: Stairway to Heaven. Very aptly named. It looked like an invitation to death. It was not a nicely widely spaced indoor round tower, with an accessible walkway and an incredibly high protective cage. It was a very spiralley, very steepley, tightly spiralled church steeple. With many many narrow stairs.  Dangerous and worn stairs, the only thing between you and the drop below a thin waist-high railing. The only thing I wanted thin and waist high in my life were a new pair of legs, the ones below me having stopped working and buckling more with every second.

And these stairs were, to give a very dated Eminem reference, round the outside round the outside.

I kid you not! Round the outside!

It’s almost like the steeple had an agenda, like it wanted you to fall off. It was displeased to be walked all over and wanted to shake you off.

‘Ready?’ asked Flo as she started to advance towards the steeple of death. I don’t think I’d ever seen her move so fast.

Leonie started to follow. This was too much. I couldn’t do this. Leonie didn’t know about my fear of heights, like so many other things I had hidden it so well up to now

My life flashed before my eyes. Happy memories of birthdays, sad memories of lost loved ones, finally remembering where I’d left that fountain pen that my Aunt Hazel had given me.

I knew there was the option to stay on the ground. Anchored, rooted, planted by panic. It would fit with the new plan; stay in the background, don’t get involved. I had only planned to escort Leonie up the round tower and then leave her anyway.

And yet.

I didn’t like where this was going, I didn’t want to leave her alone with Flo. Leonie had seemed to be improving, was more willing to go out and try things, I didn’t want this child of negativity bringing her back down again. They were in the art club together, but not alone together. Alone together was different. Was this why Leonie seemed a bit more out of it today? Was she already having an effect?

I couldn’t. I wouldn’t leave them alone together.

Oh god.

Leonie turned back to me, ‘mum?’

‘I’m coming sweetheart. And just remember, I love you’. This was it, if these were going to be my last words I wanted them to be good ones.

‘Oh, and there’s chicken in the freezer that needs using by Wednesday’.

…

I just took one step at a time. I was holding up the people behind me but I didn’t care. Leonie in front, Flo behind, I was determined that I would be in the middle and use my powers of buffer to stop anything from spreading between them.

The steps were just getting narrower and more worn as we climbed. I could not stop wondering if this had passed a health and safety test.

I just wanted to reach the top and take a break.

‘Not far now’, Flo said behind me, and I could feel her resisting the urge to physically push me.

I would reach the top eventually, and I could have a sit and a rest, that’s all I kept telling myself. A sit and a rest, a sit and a rest, a sit and a-

And then the stairs stopped. Just became narrower and narrower and narrower until poof, they disappeared. Leonie in front, me behind, we were clogged up.

‘Where do we go. Where’s the top?’ I asked.

‘You’re there,’ Flo said.

‘I beg your pardon?’ I was very Britishly outraged.

‘That’s it. Peak reached. All downhill from here’.

I stared. I could not comprehend.

‘You’re done. You just turn around and go back down’.

Turn around… and go back down? She made it sound like it was nothing. I would have to navigate with Leonie who was in front of me, get her to pass me, and then turn and try and squeeze back past all these people, with little edge support, foot support or moral support.

I couldn’t do it. I froze.

‘Need a push?’ asked Flo.

No, I didn’t need a push. I needed to go back in time and never follow you.

It’s fine. I would just stay there. Leonie and I would both stay there. I started mapping out my life, it wouldn’t be so bad, I could be a gargoyle. If anyone else wanted to visit they could just get to the point where we were and then just turn around in front of us, much like many people were doing now to be honest. We were left, pushed to one side. Everyone accepted that we were stuck. It was time for us to accept it to. That was what we had become, that was my new being, my new purpose in life, to be stuck and never move from that spot.

…

It took an hour before I could finally make my way back down. I had to close my eyes and have Flo guide my feet and Leonie guide my shoulders. In retrospect that was probably more dangerous than just walking down normally, but I wouldn’t give that anymore thought.

Safely on ground level, I just needed a moment to respectfully compose myself, certainly not go round the corner and scream into a bush.

On my return I saw Flo and Leonie sitting on the grass together. Talking together. What was this? Were they friends now? Damn it, after all that I had left them alone at the final hurdle. I had let my guard down, but only for a minute. Was that all it took? Or had they already bonded during my rescue? I had no idea, the whole thing was already nice and deeply repressed along with all of my drunken karaoke memories.

‘You have returned’, said Flo.

I grunted. I was tired, I was frustrated, I was trying to contain the trauma induced vomit.

‘You did well’, she said.

‘Don’t lie to your elders’ I replied. Which I shouldn’t have, I needed to focus on containing the morning latte that wanted to escape from my face and return to the earth.

‘No, you did. You fought your fears and were able to enjoy a wonderful piece of Copenhagen history that gives us a fantastic view of the whole city and a true Danish experience. Yes?’

Enjoy was a bit of a strong word, but she was sort of right, I guess. And she was actually being nice, and positive. Positive! Even if she looked terrifying while saying it.

Maybe deep down she really did embrace the positiveness, the happiness. She was Danish after all. Maybe I was wrong about Flo.

‘Even if that experience is ultimately hollow and meaningless.’

Maybe not.