Three words seldom used together.
True words as spoken by Carol Schultz Vento who in her book, The Hidden Legacy of World War II, A Daughter’s Journey of Discovery, weaves life with her paratrooper father into the larger narrative of World War II and the homecoming of the Greatest Generation. Her book describes the seldom told story of how the war trauma of World War II impacted one family.
War changes a soldier. It changes the family too. I can relate, as my father’s wartime experience had a huge effect on my family as well. Carol’s father, Arthur Dutch Schultz, 101st Airborne, 505th PIR and my father, David Clinton Tharp with the 502nd PIR both returned with the silent and invisible wounds of war. But were they really silent? A soldier’s reactions to things are very different when he returns home from war. I recently spoke with a veteran from Afghanistan who commented that he was not really affected as he did not see direct combat. He went on to say that they received mortar attacks daily but, “you got used to that.” This soldier continued, “I served twenty years which was eight years ago and I’m still transitioning.” I couldn’t quite believe what I was hearing. Here is a man who believes that he returned unscathed. But clearly, he was affected. He went on to say that he thinks about his service all the time and dreams about it almost every night.
How many soldiers like our fathers return home from war and jump back into the main stream of life, thinking all the while that they will be alright just by going back to work and family? Too many, you think? Although there are many rehabilitation programs in place for the American veterans of war, we need a boot camp kind of push to consistently improve the transition of all soldiers as well as the families of those soldiers ultimate transition back to civilian life, working through each phase of emotions-or lack thereof-somewhat the way a diver decompresses slowly before resurfacing.
“My late father, Arthur Dutch Schultz, for being a role model of bravery and for teaching this paratrooper daughter to always soldier on in the face of adversity.”
~ Carol Schultz Vento, author of The Hidden Legacy, available @ Sunbury Press, Inc.
May Carol and I and all other daughters and sons of veterans of war soldier on in our father’s memory and continue to explore, question and understand.
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