Sad, thankful note

[ToledoCat#2]

My uncle died last Tuesday. He lived in Missouri, was 94 and an injured survivor of WWII's Battle of the Bulge. He almost lost his leg, but the docs saved it, but it gave him pain and trouble all his life. My uncle is the last of my mother and father's generation in my extended family. His funeral is Friday. That's the sad part.

The thankful part is that I acknowledge that my uncle and his generation are responsible for my freedom today to live in the U.S. and only speak German, Italian, or Japanese if I choose a 2nd language.

I just wish the current history-deficient generation realized why it, too, should be eternally thankful for what my uncle's generation accomplished on the field of battle.

[WIldWIllieCat]

You can be thankful and honor his memory without being dismissive and disdainful of others can't you?

Maybe not I suppose.

[stlcatfan]

My uncle died last Tuesday. He lived in Missouri, was 94 and an injured survivor of WWII's Battle of the Bulge. He almost lost his leg, but the docs saved it, but it gave him pain and trouble all his life. My uncle is the last of my mother and father's generation in my extended family. His funeral is Friday. That's the sad part.

The thankful part is that I acknowledge that my uncle and his generation are responsible for my freedom today to live in the U.S. and only speak German, Italian, or Japanese if I choose a 2nd language.

I just wish the current history-deficient generation realized why it, too, should be eternally thankful for what my uncle's generation accomplished on the field of battle.

Sorry to hear about your uncle. You are right. So many people have no idea of the sacrifices that generation made so that we could live in a free country today.

[wazucat]

You can be thankful and honor is memory without being dismissive and disdainful of others can't you?

Maybe not I suppose.

[WIldWIllieCat]

You can be thankful and honor is memory without being dismissive and disdainful of others can't you?

Maybe not I suppose.

It was a beautiful post, with meaningful sentiment. I just don't see the need for the "damn kids these day" ending.

Sorry to hear about your Uncle Toledo, celebrate that 94 though, that's damned impressive -even more so considering what he experienced.

[Mauser]

Lay off WWC this isn't the sward you want to fall on.

Sorry for your loss Toledo.

[WIldWIllieCat]

Give Toledo a little credit.

I still think 94 is pretty damned impressive.

Toledo, might I humbly request you share with us a story or anecdote of your Uncle? Of course we should mourn his passing, but we can celebrate his life too. I would greatly appreciate you indulging me on this....

[RichardZ]

I am standing upon the seashore. A ship, at my side,
spreads her white sails to the moving breeze and starts
for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength.
I stand and watch her until, at length, she hangs like a speck
of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.

Then, someone at my side says, "There, she is gone."

Gone where?

Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast,
hull and spar as she was when she left my side.
And, she is just as able to bear her load of living freight to her destined port.
Her diminished size is in me -- not in her.

And, just at the moment when someone says, "There, she is gone,"
there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices
ready to take up the glad shout, "Here she comes!"

And that is dying...

….Henry Jackson Van Dyke

Toledo, the Greatest Generation are slipping fast from our midst. Their sacrifice in time and hurt and lives should not ever be forgotten.

As an aside my Dad was in the Battle of the Bulge. I was born when he was in Germany and I was a couple of years old when he returned. He passed away at age 66.

[ToledoCat#2]

Uncle Ellwyn laughed and smiled a lot during his life. Perhaps, it was because he was grateful to have survived WWII, when so many thousands of his peers did not.
I recall two stories about Uncle Ellwyn’s recovery from his grievous war wound. First one, when he was in a body cast from head to toe, the military transferred him back to the states for treatment. However, it insisted on following military protocol that every transported veteran had to wear a parachute on the trip across the Atlantic. Uncle Ellwyn wryly commented that, if his plane crashed, a parachute would make no difference at all because he was headed to the deep briny bottom like a body cast sinker.
The second story I recall happened during his rehab. In trying to find enough of his own skin to cover his leg wound, one step was to grow one arm to a roll of skin on his belly. He wuz mobile during that time and he and my aunt and my mother were eating at a diner in Kansas City when a dear old lady hobbled up to my uncle, who looked like he had his arm in a sling, and wondered aloud to my uncle how he got his obvious war injury.
As the family narrative goes, without a sign of humor crossing his face, my uncle patiently related this story: He was assigned to the chaplain service and was responsible for cranking the pipe organ during in-the-field church services. During one service, just as he got the old pipe organ up to full capacity, the engine on it backfired and the crank recoiled and broke my uncle’s arm.
The little old lady replied how terrible that accident was and then thanked my uncle for his service.

[RichardZ]

A sense of humor can certainly carrying you along nicely along life's road.