80th Anniversary of Pearl Harbor, Rambles and a Brief Movie Mention

 

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This is a special day, a sobering day.   One of our daughters volunteered at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii five years ago helping with our most beautiful Greatest Generation, those glorious heroes still living, those who did not perish.

 

One living hero was Uncle Bob we affectionately called him after our daughter would get to know him...He would call us and she would call him and we'd sing Happy Birthday to him and he'd sing Tony Bennett songs to us, he was a fantastic singer.

He was at the White House several years ago and President Trump remarked what great posture this fella had, just like a twenty year old!  I agree, that same fella showed my daughter how to do a dance there at Pearl Harbor...so cute.

 

Yeah...Our daughter would be talking to him and he would be at Taco Bell as he was eating dinner with an elderly friend...it would go...Where are we eating at?   Taco Bell says his friend loudly,  Where?  ... Taco Bell!!!    ...Oh dear me! ...sooooo funny..  Love those guys.

He was a hoot and we've sadly, most sadly lost touch, my daughter has left messages and we haven't heard back...He could be on the other side of Heaven, it breaks our hearts.  It's one of those things where you're almost afraid to know.

 

His story was that on the morning of Pearl Harbor when the Japanese attacked he was down in the ship getting ready for the morning, he hadn't even put on his shirt yet.  He jumped up on deck and grabbed the gigantic gun and just started shooting up at the Japanese planes....A kamikaze had swooped down so low he saw the kamikaze's face that was still clear as day to him 75 years later.  The kamikaze had glasses on he remembered...

 

 

Rambles...

Back then in our family my dad was eleven years old and had just lost his mother who I'm named after.  My dad as that little boy then attended Gulfport Military Academy in Biloxi Mississippi, and he remembered carrying dummy guns because their guns had been given to the war effort after Pearl Harbor.  My dad said the plane formations at night looked like Christmas trees in the sky!  My uncle, my dad's older brother Uncle Wesley had just married, a Rice graduate, back then majoring in drama.  It's funny, both my dad and his brother were masculine handsome rascals, definitely what we would call head turners but never into sports much, mostly drama, history, and good books coupled with common sense.  My uncle was very tall, and my dad was the shorter guy.  Both attended the same military academy and then off to college.  It's so interesting I think.  My uncle and his wife had a  baby girl and they lived in the home I was eventually raised in.  His wife parted ways after some horrible riffs after my uncle passed away in his twenties, a horrible death I'll write about another time.  I've always wanted to locate the baby girl who is my first cousin.  For years I tried to find her.   Finally one day the Lord quickened me to go to try to find something looking up a few names; I had, his wife's first name in particular.  Yes!  I found it in a society page from Youngstown University school paper where my uncle eventually attended, where he and his Dallas-born wife had met .  They were married in an old, old Episcopal church in nearby downtown, I would love to go there to that church to visit but no, it looks woke like the rest of'em.  But I had finally found my cousin!  Looking for part of her name and clues on facebook.  There she was after years of looking!  She's probably eighteen years older then I and we look very much alike but she is tall like her dad and I'm short like my dad.  Both our dads were blondish and blue eyed and both our moms were brunettes with brown eyes.  It's amazing.  She is an artist too, she has achieved quite a bit in the world's eyes, designing all kinds of things, from wall art in a ritzy New York hotel to a Disney land ballroom floor.  She loves animals like I do and is a character I guess like my dad was...She lives right here in the city in the ritzy part where she is her own person, raising butterflies inside her home and gardening. Just fiercely independent as I am in certain ways. For me?  I'm soft spoken  but very honest, and can also be a character if you get to know me, and I lough loudly from my soul.  

As my cousin, there was a problem I ran into...I never got to talk or correspond with her.  I refuse to get into the vortex of face book, just not my style for various reasons.  But my young adult daughters were very active on it back then and they wrote my cousin, she responded nicely and transparently to family history and she was given my email.  I copied and pasted a heartfelt letter twice to her through my daughter's fb account.  No go.  It was the strangest thing.   She would never write me back and she finally de-friended my daughters.  We don't get it, we're even politically on the same page so that was not the problem.   So.  Life goes on but I never had the pleasure of meeting her or even corresponding in writing to her.  Isn't that sad?  She has no family to speak of, also an only child.  So I have no idea under the sun why she would not communicate with me, she was raised not far from here by her grandparents  on their ranch with  beautiful horses and my cousin was trained as a skilled horsewoman. She was raised  right under my nose in some respects.  So.  Life goes on and that is one mystery unsolved why she won't communicate with me. I still pray I will run into her one day when Jem and I are making our rounds in downtown and eating at a restaurant. I could spot her in an instant.  God must know my heart can take that kind of thing, as an old friend told me once when I was in my thirties...Amelia, you've had more disappointments then most people have had in a lifetime.  I guess God knew I could take it...He's made my heart tender and I'm well aware of what life can dish out but He's given me wisdom and discernment on life from many experiences.  The School of Christ.  ...There I go...being transparent, but.  That's a Gift.   Not everyone can do that or have the courage to do that I have found.  

A Christmas Tribute to the 80th Anniversary of Pearl Harbor

Here are some photos of one of the Christmas decorations here honoring Pearl Harbor.  I was stoked to find original 40s piano sheet music from the movie that depicts Pearl Harbor and the Doolittle Raid, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo.  You can see my entry from last month on Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo.  Love that movie...love, love, love it.

 Phyllis Thaxter and Van Johnson..Van Johnson's character says:  How did I get a girl so cute?   Phyllis Thaxter's character, his wife says...I had to be cute to get a guy like you.

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I love the ads on the back of the sheet music too... Oh my heart.  

 

 

 

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The green lit up little house is a Christmas greenhouse our daughter Joycie bought me for me last year at Christmas time...It's fascinating.  I'll have to show the inside one day.  The angel was given to me by our daughter, Grace.

 

Here are two links from the 75th anniversary of Pearl Harbor when one of our daughters volunteered there.

    HERE   and   HERE

 

Another movie suggestion is The Fighting Sullivans (1944)

A true story, the Pacific War Museum in Fredericksburg, Texas has an entire display that is absolutely wonderful showing the mother reading her letter to the president, an actress reading the part.   That museum is absolutely ace in my book, you must go there if you are in that area of the country.

 

Both my dad and my precious step dad, a soft hearted Italian artist from the Bronx were vets.  Oh how I miss both of them!  

 

Just some rambles and a tribute to our heroes.   Appreciate them....Oh appreciate them.

   Signing off from My Forest Cathedral