My older daughter was
up late, on Saturday morning. The Mrs.
and the little one were leaving for school event. I fried some onion and mushrooms and tossed
them into a lentil salad for her. “It’s
good.” That’ll do. “What are you reading
in English?” “‘The Things They
Carried.’ Did you read that to me
before? I feel like I’ve already read
it.” “I don’t think so. I went through a period, I suppose it was
twenty years ago when I read everything I could get my hands on about the
Vietnam War. I read it then. It was powerful. There is a memorable description of him
killing a Viet Cong soldier. But there are other books about that war, that I
liked more . . . “
“What are you up to in Humanities?” “World War I”
“Really? Cool.” I say with a bit too much enthusiasm. “We are starting this week.” “Think about the places you’ve been: The Turks are on the loosing side and its the
end of the Ottoman Empire. The Irish War
of Independence starts while the British are sunk into war in France. The Germans loose and all their colonies are
redistributed. You remember the May 4th
Movement? All those students flipped out
because Shandong was turned over to the Japanese for management.”
And as the discussion returned, as it must to the brutality
of trench warfare thoughts turn to mustard gas. I imagined the old copy of “The
Norton Anthology of Poetry” and felt a pang of remorse because while part of my
mind was considering my shelves, another voice quickly shot down the idea: You don’t have a copy of “Dulce et Decorum
Est” here. And it doesn’t matter, said a
third voice. You have the internet.
Soon we were tired and deaf to the sounds of the “Five-Nines
that dropped behind. Gas! Gas!
Quick boys!” I'd never seen his
photo before. Poor handsome Wilfred
Owen. Poor world.
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