I Know Wars I Remember

I Know Wars    I Remember

November is Remembrance Month for me.  I have much to remember. 

My adoptive father was in the Canadian Militia in 1917.  His uniform is in the Cardston, Alberta Museum.  He spoke little of it.  And, there are few photos.  When he spoke of it, and that was very very seldom, he spoke of caring for his horse and he spoke of Nathan Eldon Tanner, his cousin who married my adoptive mother's double cousin.  There is one photo, published in a book, that shows a line of men, looking smart in their red felt uniforms.  He looks young and old at the same time, the way that men looked in that decade.  He has his sword hanging down his side.  One of my favorite things to do, with my father, was to go and stand at the cenotaph, November 11.  It was a solemn time.  My father was a solem man, that is, until my kids were born and then he truly came alive around them.

My birth father, we know, was in the Canadian Army.  There is a photo oif a tall, swarthy man, striding along a village street with a girl on his arm.  Smart looking he was.  She looked a great deal like me.  We know his name and have had some findings through DNA.  We know little else.  But, he was in WWII.

My adoptive father had 8 sons.  He sent five of them off to WWII, to England, as RCAF pilots.  One died over Belgium.  He had each son's photo in their frames.  They, too, looked young yet old as was the times.  Not one of the brothers ever spoke much of their time flying through shot skies.  I heard they were ace pilots and Canada is very much loved over there in Europe.  I think often of those small town boys, all leaving, together, at the same time, saying goodbye to a mother they would never see again.  She died before she heard of DeVoe's dying.  I cannot imagine their mother's fear at having five of her boys going to war.  I cannot imagine.  I can know, a bit of what it felt like though.

Two of my boys were in Reserves.  My youngest son signed up in his late twenties, and is a Veteran of Afghanistan.  Oh, yes, I know a little.  One fifth of what my brother's mother felt.  I know those months of my absolute fear for him, every day.  I know about the wait for a video chat, a photo being posted, a letter.  I know even greater fear when he came home so broken.  Soemtimes military wives cannot wait.  He came home to be a single parent dad.  It was a blessing he had those two little kids to keep him struggling not to end it all when he came home.  Months of darkness followed but a dedication to his little boy and little girl helped him beat it down.  He learned to beat things down from me.  While he was deployed, I know that I had to beat down the fear.  He is still on a base in Alberta; and every time I hear of something going on in the world (war and rumors of war - the fear of war mongers)- that fear grips my heart like an iron fist.  There is not a day go by that I do not give absolute gratitude for the hero he is and what his stalwart wife and his seven children sacrifice for him to be that hero.  I will never forget to be grateful for his sacrifice and what being the mother of a soldier can mean.

I know war.  I remember.

©Carol Desjarlais 11.7.18