Like the rest of the country, I'm reading "Unbroken" by Laura Hillebrand. The book is a fascinating account on one man's life, a guy born in the twenties in California. I'm at the part where he is in a B24 in the Pacific in World War II, and, as my Dad was an Army Air Force pilot, I'm getting a glimpse of what it must have been like for him. I'd always thought, since my Dad was stationed on the border between Texas and Mexico, he wasn't really in danger, but this book has taught me that was not the case. Over 52,000 US airmen were killed in the war, and 3/4 of them were in accidents not combat. I know my Dad was pretty much deaf in one ear because of his service, and now, when I put it together, maybe my Mom's first war sweetheart, who was killed, was one of those. The planes were tin cans with lots of flaws, and the pilots were daredevils. I've heard the stories of how my Dad would buzz Mom's apartment house.
And how did the war change him? His line was that it made him a man, and the relatives said he was a hellion before and the service set him straight. He never, ever talked about it. What did he see? I'll never know now. I regret not asking and being curious. Dad never was one for his past - he was as forward thinking as they come, and now I wonder if he felt he had to be. And my mother never spoke in any detail about her first fiance, just that he died in the war. How did that set the course of her life? They were happy, enthusiastic people, but they were impatient, also. They had no truck with prejudice and petty selfish concerns. They called a spade a spade, as they would have said.
I think I am beginning to see why.
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