To me, “father” and “soldier” are almost antithetical words. My 89-year-old parent was an English professor. He taught Shakespeare. His world was (and still is to a certain extent) a man of theatre, books, film and intellectual banter. A hammer and a screwdriver were dangerous tools in his hands. His mind was much stronger than his muscles.
But my father was indeed a soldier. He served in the South Pacific for three years as a sailor on a Mine Sweeper. Like many from his generation, he did not speak much about his service during World War II. His stories had more to do with the salamis his mother sent him, escapes to hiding places to read and sea sickness, than they did with battles, blood and death.
Slowly, just because I was tenacious in my curiosity, did he begrudgingly tell of his brave Captain who saved his life through a Monsoon; or the times that his ship morphed into a hospital unit; or his relief in learning of American victory so that he might return home.
“Didn’t it affect your life? Weren’t you scared? Did you ever think you would die”?, I would ask. “I didn’t think about it that way. That is what we all did. There was no other way,” he would answer as a matter of fact.
My teenage brain could not understand. I needed more. Finally, he told me that six months after he returned, while getting ready for Shabbat dinner, he burst out in a deep cry for a half hour. He wiped off his tears and went to have dinner with his family. He didn’t remember processing the reaction with his parents. “I guess I needed to let it all out somehow and that was my reaction. I have never thought much about it since,” he told me.
Needless to say, as we commemorate Veterans Day this week, we are a nation so exhausted from almost fourteen years of war. As much as we try to extricate ourselves from battle, there is no clear end in sight. We no longer send ALL of our children to serve and I wonder if we have lost our connection to the “soldier’s narrative.” My father’s generation didn’t think they were anything special because they were all obliged to serve our country. It didn’t matter if you were made to be a soldier or not.
I am as opposite of a soldier as my father was in his day. But in a strange way, I long for his time when service was not an option. He grew up faster. He understood obligation to others sooner. He learned to navigate a complicated world before he graduated college.
We don’t know the soldier’s story today because we are not asked to serve ourselves. During this week when we honor those who fight on our behalf, I think it is our obligation to know the America whose stories are too often hidden. And, it is time that all of us think about service of all types. Many of us are not cut out to; or inclined to fight as soldiers, but we live in a country crying out for us to serve in a variety of ways which can help us become whole.
Moved by this post? Join the conversation through MyJewishLearning’s weekly blogs newsletter.
