Remembering the mystery of war…

My father fought in World War Two but I don’t know much about it because he never wanted to talk about it. I think he fought in Italy among other places. I know he was a paratrooper, at least for a while. I also know he had a lot of Nazi military souvenirs such as medals, insignia, and even a German Luger pistol. I can only assume he had been given these things from his friends and perhaps even taken them from the bodies of dead German soldiers. These items were sold long after I left home and now there are none left. I didn’t even know they had been sold until I expressed a renewed curiosity about them.

Like I said, I don’t know because he refused to speak about the times or to answer my questions. Every now and then he would reminisce about silly things like soldiers riding bicycles and drinking a lot of wine. These were peripheral, humorous, stories that ended abruptly when I began to get too curious.

My father continued in the Army, briefly attaining officer status and ended up as a Sargent. I don’t know why. He eventually was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy and drummed out of the military. He entered public service as a customs border agent until he died in 1991.

I had left home early in my teens, leaving and coming back a few times. I had quit school, never finishing high school. In desperation, I was talked into joining the army myself, much to my mother’s dismay. So I spent an immature and reckless year and a half, if I remember correctly. I finally decided to quit and ended up briefly in military jail for interfering with a military exercise. It was just a night in jail as a scare tactic, nothing serious. It was just a bunch of us little boys running around at night leaping out and scaring those real soldiers who were on a base defense exercise. We were caught by a Chief Warrant Officer and marched off to spend the night in the local MP jail.

We were already on the discharge list at that time, doing odd jobs around the base, including working at an underground bunker of some kind that was designed to shelter the Ontario government from military attack. I remember there were desks with the names of important political leaders on them. I never figured out why they had us working there, unless it was to entice us to stay in the military because somehow it was “cool.”

Anyway, like I said, we were immature idiots having a blast. It is something I would certainly do differently if I had a chance to re-live that time. Today, I would join the military in a heartbeat if I was a free man and not some old guy with a great wife who would kill him if he even considered the idea. Wow, that’s some heartbeat. Maybe even as strong as the heartbeat that stills echoes from my father.

War is a mysterious thing. It struck me that it is like karate in this way: Violence and conflict is hated and avoided as long as possible, until one is forced to defend oneself from others who have no such moral repulsion against conflict. I train hard to know karate and practice and learn, hoping that I will never have to use these skills anywhere else but in a fun, skill-testing tournament. I feel more confident and stronger, such that I can resist resorting to violence even more than I could before. Our military also trains hard and seeks to be strong for exactly the same reasons. To avoid conflict. To be strong and capable of helping without violence. The immoral strong will always prey on the weak, especially those who appear weak and defenseless.

I support our military, and honor them too. Even though, being composed of human beings of relatively young age, some of them might act silly from time to time.

Yes, I remember, but I think I was a little too sheltered to remember much…