"Serenity........................................."

These last week or so, thanks to cable’s giving me the ability to record and watch later, I’ve been able to take in several episodes of the educational channel’s presentation of “The War”, about three hours worth thus far and not necessarily chronologically coming at me. Some of the events took place in North Africa; others focused on our entrance into the Pacific arena. The landing at the southern end of Italy became not much more than a beachhead until we got behind the enemy lines at Anzio in an attempt to initiate a push toward Rome. It is actual footage of our soldiers in battle, today’s portion also including what it was like for Air Force bomber crews to battle both flak and German fighter pilots. A narrator walks you through all the history, but the story is continually punctuated with both survivors who were there and those who lived through it here at home telling of their experiences. The attraction, for me, has nothing at all to do with combat and carnage. This is that generation I knew as father and mother, aunts and uncles, the era into which I was introduced just fifty four days prior to Pearl Harbor. My dad served, leaving behind a wife and three small children. It was a world only familiar to me afterwards, my first vivid memory of such time being his return, my mom carrying my younger brother and walking me and my sister down the street when he walked out of an alley-way, surprising us, his duffel bag slung over his shoulder. It was a time yet steeped in segregation, the film, in all truthfulness, showing just how hypocritical we were in demanding those we still held in a form of slavery to give their lives in a fight for freedom; but, nonetheless, to this old man it remains framed and treasured, happiness in my neck of the words, no television, no computer technology, just family and friends facing each morning as it came to us, life not so full of global threat, the enemy having been defeated… Will my grandkids likewise look back and recall their own past? I’m not so sure anymore of this mess that we are passing on to them. My only confidence is in an anchorage that wasn’t known until my adult years, an assurance each of us must find for ourself, but a river in which they have been swimming almost since birth. In Him I trust and to Him I continually commit those who hold my heart. Peace, as it always has, is an internal gift of God…….