Laowai

Claire brought home the Diary of Anne Frank. I’m ashamed to say I’ve never read it before. But now that I am reading it I am amazed. I’m amazed at what a smart insightful person Anne Frank was. How can it be that she was only 14 and 15 when she wrote her diaries? Was she precociously wise because she knew unconsciously that she would not get to live her full life? I was at the point in the book where it was May 1944 and Anne and the other people in the annex talked of the coming invasion all the time. And then suddenly in my own life it was the 75th anniversary of D-Day. Again, I’m ashamed that the date – June 6th – does not live in my brain. Yes, I always notice when it is mentioned in the media, but I don’t think of early June and automatically associate it with D-Day. Maybe now I will. The war has seemed much more real and vivid to me now in comparison to when I learned about it in school. I watched the coverage of the 75th anniversary memorial ceremony on BBC. Many old men traveled to Normandy and I teared up watching their faces and hearing the military bands play. I also listened to the excellent BBC podcast called Witness History. They played the old broadcasts that were made from the battlefield on D-Day and interviews of soldiers too. I thought of my grandpa, who didn’t fight in D-Day but was there in Europe afterwards. The place where this all happened used to feel like a far off place that I could not imagine. But now I am close to Germany, I am close to France, Brian is in London now. 

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I want to go to Normandy and see the memorials and the museums and the land and the sea. And even though my girls usually seem to roll their eyes when Brian and I talk about history. I want to take them there – I’m sure something will sink in and it will impact us all. It is a huge advantage when learning about something to be able to go to the place where it all happened. My girls have both been learning about the Roman Empire and then we coincidentally went to several places where there were Roman ruins all around. How lucky! 

Thinking of D-Day – how very fortunate I feel in so many ways.