Remembering

I think about my Dad all year long, but Veterans Day always gives me special pause. I don't talk a lot about my family to most people, which I think comes from years of wanting to escape my unremarkable small town upbringing. My Dad has been an especially hard subject for me ever since he died 8 years ago. But for an otherwise ordinary man, he did extraordinary service to is country, and that is something I want to talk about. So here are the broad strokes of his story, as best I can remember.

Sergeant William B. Jarrell served in the Army Air Corps during WWII and flew in B17 Bombers (aka The Flying Fortress), serving as a gunner. During one bombing run, his plane was shot down over Germany, and landed in a mine field. As he was escaping the plane, a mine nearby exploded and buried shrapnel in his leg. He was then captured by the German Army and held as a prisoner of war of 18 months at a camp called Stalag 17-B. During his captivity, he developed gangrene in his injured leg and required emergency surgery. There was a shortage of anesthesia at the time, so after drinking as much whiskey as he could hold to numb the pain, several of his buddies had to hold him down while doctors cut out the infected part of his leg. A wonderful French surgeon saved his leg, and most likely his life, that day. I remember seeing a picture of him once and attempting to interpret the note on the back of the photo with my rudimentary high school French. His best friend was fellow crew member named Reuben, a Navajo Indian. After the Normandy invasion, he and his fellow prisoners were finally returned home, my Dad with a permanent souvenir of the experience via a huge scar in his thigh. I think he would have loved to keep flying after the war, but he suffering a bleeding eardrum that affected his hearing, which kept him out of the cockpit. Later in life, he ended up with hearing aids in both ears. So instead of flying, he got a job, bought a house, and worked at building a life and a family.

My grandmother kept a scrapbook with newspaper clippings while he was imprisoned. I remember looking at it as little girl and thinking it was neat my Daddy got mentioned in the paper, without understanding the magnitude of what it meant. Imagine living with that agony as a mother, thinking about your child suffering and wondering if you would ever see them again. As an adult, I'm amazed at my grandmothers strength. Although my father's situation was the most grave, his family sent all four of their sons to serve our country during WWII and the Korean War. It is a miracle they all lived into old age given the violence and terror they faced.

When my dad was still alive, I never spent any time asking him about his experiences, or what he thought about subsequent wars he lived through as a citizen but not a soldier. Once, his VFW group planned a trip back to Germany, to see the places they had been during the war, and I recall him commenting he had already seen enough of the world and had no desire to relive the past. I know he didn't sleep through the night most of the time. If I woke up during the night to go to the bathroom, I would catch him out of the corner of my eye through the cracked bedroom door, sitting on the corner of the bed smoking. I wonder now what haunted his dreams and kept him up at night.

I don't even know why he enlisted, although I think I can guess his answer. It was simply the right thing to do. He grew up in a modest, hard-working family where what needed to be done always superseded what you wanted. He lived through the Great Depression. Life was hard. Burdens were shouldered, and you kept moving forward, trying to make the best life you could without making excuses for what you didn't have.

My father had a strength and determination that I've never known in another person. My mother says I'm just like him. And in that respect, I hope I am.