Arms and the Finerman
Happy Veterans Day.
I don’t think that a member of my family has seen combat since 1905. (Unless you count family dinners, in which case, I make Audie Murphy seem like a Quaker.) My great-uncle Joe fought in the Russo-Japanese War. Can you guess which side? The wrong one, of course. Aside from being on the losing side, he probably would have found the Mikado less Anti-Semitic than the Tsar.
Both of my parents served in the army during World War II. My mother, as a librarian at Ft. Hood, actually came closer to fighting the Civil War. Being in Texas, Ft. Hood had segregated facilities but that didn’t include the library. No one expected the “coloreds” to use it. One African-American did, however. When he returned some books, my mother apparently said something provocative by Southern standards: “thank you.” An army sergeant wrote her a reprimand: “White ladies do not talk to the coloreds.”
My father’s military career was less harrowing. He had a fine singing voice so he was assigned to the U.S. Army Chorus. Even though we were fighting a world war on two fronts, the military brass still required receptions with entertainment. Once the Army Chorus was sent to the Bahamas to serenade its governor, the Duke of Windsor. That was the closest my father ever came to a Nazi.
And if I am permitted to create my own heroic mythology, I can just imagine one of my ancestors as the morale officer at Masada. Of course, given the family resemblance, he would have been court-martialed for ordering in pizzas.
Be sure to wish to thank a veteran today…even if he is your cantankerous father-in-law.