Daniel Barkhuff has a serious one-liner bio (“Husband, Dad, Emergency Medicine physician, Veteran”) and speaks with earned authority from all of them, especially the last two. His latest, On Living Memory, reminds me of two dads.

One is my father, who re-enlisted in 1944 at age 35, because he wanted to fight in The War. Among other things, he participated in liberating a concentration camp. Afterward, he hated dentistry because drilling teeth smelled like burning bone. That was all he wanted to say about it. He also avoided fireworks because his main job in the Signal Corps was running ahead of blasting cannons on advancing lines, laying communication cables to forward locations, getting as close as possible to enemy positions.

The other was  Jim Hodksins, father of David, my long-time business partner, and three other sons. The obituary text on Jim Hodskins’ FindaGrave page says this: “Jim saw combat action in Europe, and served until he was badly injured in January, 1945. For his service, Jim was awarded the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart, the Infantry Combat Badge, and several other achievement ribbons and medals.” David told me his dad seldom talked about The War, despite or perhaps because of all those ribbons and medals. His pride was invested elsewhere.

Both those dads are now gone, and with them the memory of what they fought and why. Read what Barkhuff says about that.

Bonus link.