Today's Times, in the Home Fires section, is running a piece titled "Lives During Wartime". It's a compilation of memories submitted by veterans or their families and friends. All of them are interesting, some chilling, some humorous, some remarkable at capturing raw of emotion of war. One of the more vivid pieces was submitted by veteran Brandon Cato and I wanted to share it here:
"It is, I feel, an impossible dream to reconcile these two periods — the before and the after — torn by a fissure of violent exposure that has since been filled in with oceans of time. The presence of an unnatural sternness, a departure of the whimsical self and an ingrained sense of suspicion that will, by default, assume the worst of people. In the wake of the war I am alive, if not unshaken, and grateful for every breath I take." --Brandon Cato
Brandon's pic and post, along with the other posts, can be found here: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/10/l … ef=opinion
Other submissions and the website found here: http://www.sixwordwar.com/archive