As we come to Veteran’s Day next week, I’m thinking of those who sacrifice for the United States. I’m not a veteran. But I know some. My husband, Vietnam; my dad, WWII. Neither speak/spoke of war unless pressed. My Air Force grandsons will be veterans, one day.
I even wrote a book about the experience of a veteran, at his request, when he could see his end was near. My father-in-law, who spent most of WWII as a prisoner of war of the Japanese, rarely had anything to say about his time in the Army. Only the radiation burn on his cheek told us he’d been near Hiroshima and Nagasaki when we dropped the bombs on them. We knew he had shrapnel in his spine and wore compression stockings to help the pain in his legs that resulted from having them frozen. That about covered it as far as he was concerned, even for his own children.
But as he talked with the staff at the veteran’s hospital he visited more frequently as he aged, they pressed him to write his story. He did me the great honor of helping him bring it to light. He called it Triumphs and Tragedies, Corregidor and Its Aftermath. It’s available on Amazon, Arthur B. Baker and J. Carlile Baker authors. Please buy the one you get from me. I can’t believe some others are asking over $100 a copy because it’s out of print. I’ll be happy to send you one for the $10 he initially asked. Dad has gone on to live with Jesus, but he showed me what a hero looks like and does before he left. And I am blessed.
What a privilege to help write his story!
He taught me so much as we wrote, and I am changed.