An Homage to the Greatest Generation
Tonight at dinner, I asked my grandma to tell me a story. My grandma just turned 86 years old and is a recovering stroke victim from a stroke about 10 years ago.
She replied, “I can’t think of any.” This is the same person who would regale me with endless stories of her life during World War II, her childhood, her art career, and so on. A little discouraged, I tried to coax her into thinking of one, knowing that her memory and mind aren’t what they used to be.
“What about the one about how you were at the football game with Papa Joe when they made the announcement about Pearl Harbor,” I said, hoping to remind her of one of her most infamous stories, which I’ve heard dozens of times but wanted to hear again nonetheless.
To my surprise, she said, “I can’t remember.”
I was shocked, but not only that. I was sad. This is THE story she told me. I wish I could remember the teams that were playing, but long story short, she and my grandfather were at an NFL game when an announcement came over the loudspeaker that the Japanese had just bombed Pearl Harbor.
Gradually, I kept pushing her to remember stories. Not the football one — that one has been lost forever, I’m afraid. But others slowly but surely came back into focus for her. She remembered the one about the Arizona Army base she and my grandfather were stationed at while he was training troops. How the camp doubled as a German POW camp. How it was so barren, and so desolate in Arizona at that time, the POWs would rather stay in the camp on their own accord than try to escape because exposure to the Arizona desert, with no civilization for hundreds of miles, meant certain death.
She remembered how the soldiers my grandfather was training would beg her to paint their portraits so they could send them to their mothers. How they would push and shove each other to be next in line.
She remembered her career as a commercial artist, and the time someone in the city wanted a painting from her so badly, he bought all the supplies for her to use, including the paint and a piece of stretched canvas so big, it had to be delivered to her home studio on the back of a truck.
We talked for a while, she remembered stories, she laughed, she smiled, and I told her I was going to make her tell me a new story every day. She said, “That’s a great idea.”
Why do the elderly forget things? Why do they lose track of what they were passionate about?
I think it’s because no one asks them to remember. Well, I’m going to start asking both of my remaining grandmothers. I’ve heard millions of stories from each of them, but now is the time to listen.
America’s Greatest Generation is lonely, and we are losing them now more quickly than before. If you’re able to, talk to your grandparents. Ask them a question. Ask them to tell you a story, even if you’ve heard it all before. Hear it while you still can, because one day, there will be no more stories to listen to.
