I don't want to talk about war. I don't want to talk about its hardships or its atrocities. I don't want to talk about the fit, healthy men and women who come home with broken minds and bodies, or the ones who never come home at all.
I do want to talk about my Grandfather. His memory weighs heavily upon me on days such as ANZAC Day and Remembrance Day. I want to talk about him. I want to regale you all with stories of his service to his country. I want to, but I can't.
The memories I have of him are patchy. Calling him for dinner. Showing him pictures of my life. Happy memories but never memories of his life. Never memories of him as a young man, memories painted through stories told with old lips and tired eyes.
I was 9 years old when he died. Two and a half decades later, if I could go back and talk to any of my grandparents, it would be him. It has always been him. I want to fill in the blanks of his life. I want to know the answers to all the questions I was too young to ask.
I think, having read many an account of war from other veterans, I'm not sure I would have been ready to hear his stories when I knew him. I don't know if the reason he never talked about was that it was too upsetting for him or if no-one really asked. Whatever the reason, his stories are now lost to the winds and my heart aches for him and for his story.
Maybe that's why I write. Maybe I don't want my story to be lost. Maybe I'll never go to war, or become famous, or do something of note, but I will have a story to tell. It will be my little story, and it will be a story my grandfather would be proud of.
Lest we forget.
R.I.P. Richard Arrowsmith 1903-1989
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