I'm not as dumb as I look.

Bandleader Glenn Miller

I've known a number of WWII combat vets, a couple rather well. One I already told you about, a medic in Belgium after D-Day. They called him Cotton, and his story is here >

The other was a WWII bomber pilot. "I'm not as dumb as I look," he often said, and "I read a lot." He told us about the little Filipino they called Shithouse Sam who cleaned the latrine for the flyboys, and that if you hit a train engine just right, it would go "poof" like a giant exploding feather pillow.

They each saw a lot of destruction, but one was a healer while the other a destroyer. They both played their roles, and though both are probably gone now, had they met, they probably would have just shrugged and said, "That's war."

But when the healer came home, his parents made him sleep in the barn because he kept waking at night screaming.

When the bomber came home, he walled up his conscience with jokes and memories that lilted like Glenn Miller tunes.

c0

I try to remember that, as I age, indelible personalities from my past become unfamiliar to others. Glenn Miller was swing bandleader during the WWII era. He disappeared in 1944 over the English Channel.

I'm sure you recognize this tune:

c0

The most difficult and painful part of writing is knowing when to stop, for most writers don't stop writing because they've run out of things to say, but because they've said enough, well enough, and more would be a distraction.[1]

I'm tempted to go on for pages about Cotton and the bomber, but I'm not sure it would add much.

c0

[1]
This sounds better, doesn't it? "but because they've said enough, well enough, and more would be less," but because it's cliche I avoided it.

[2014-11-07]

c0