We are now into the second episode. One boy dies. Another is held captive in the hell of a Japanese prison camp. A young girl and her family spend the entire war sequestered in the Philippines in an internment camp. So do thousands of Japanese in the U.S. Days pass by as Italy is invaded, a gain of only 50 miles. At home food is rationed and blue—and gold—star flags fly in each window.

It was spending my early life with parents and older cousins who lived through World War II: when I look at the film and the photos, I feel as if a gateway could open up and I could step through. I feel kinship with these people. So many of my cousins were older than me. My cousin Anthony, now lost in Alzheimers, fought in World War II. My cousin Skippy, who has survived two wives, did also. My cousin Raymond who just passed away, was a young soldier back then. My dad was almost thirty when Pearl Harbor was attacked. He fought in Germany, in the Black Forest, and in Austria. My mother remembered hearing the news of Pearl Harbor and everyone in their closely-knit Italian community went to church. Brothers, cousins, best friends and schoolmates went to war. Mom and her future sister-in-law waited for my Uncle Sammy to come home. My grandmother cried when he left and cried again when he came home, his thick hair lost to the relentless rubbing of his helmet, he suffering from nightmares from the carnage he saw in the Pacific.

They are all so close every time I watch programs like these.

Labels: history, memories

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:28:00 PM

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