Is anyone watching this? The thing I find so impressive about the way Burns presents the past is that there is a great deal of respect, but his presentation lacks the jingoism there clearly was at the time, and the jingoism there is today with the current war.
I don't feel threatened by not being accused of being patriotic enough, or not suffering enough. But I also don't feel that I want to experience this "good war" -- Burns never loses sight of the people who fought and the awful things they saw, and experiences they had. The show this evening ended with someone talking about how he felt guilty wishing that someone would be quiet, but realizing that this was a man moaning as he died. His best friend. And there was recognition of how awful this sounded, but no apologies either. This was his life, this was what he had experienced, and he spoke of it quietly and calmly. It made it more powerful.
I like Burns's selection of four widespread communities, and tracing the lives of the soldiers and the homefront, is like listening to my parents talk. These are the stories they tell, the lives they led. My dad's family was in Boston -- several worked in the shipyards there. My mom moved from northern Nevada to Las Vegas during the war. Her dad was a judge there. She had two older brothers who fought during the war. The oldest got two purple hearts. When my grandmother died they found the medals in her house -- the only purple hearts I have ever seen in person. They also found a samurai sword that my uncle picked up somehow, somewhere during the time he was in the south Pacific.
They knew how scary the war was. My father was older and his older brother was drafted earlier than he was (my dad was inducted in 1944, after D-Day). We just buried his older brother, who was 86. My dad is 81. He is literally the last group who were in the war. He has his medals for service, as he served in the North Atlantic. But he never saw combat, for which I am grateful.
More than a year ago I posted excerpts from my dad's journal about Pearl Harbour. He kept a journal from 1939 to 1944, when he went into the Navy, from age 12 to 18. I may post a few more excerpts later this week. I have been thinking much of him, and of the families that are now largely gone (my mom and dad are both the last ones of their generation in their families).
I guess this is not so much about Burns's documentary, but about what it makes me think about. Sorry about that. No real useful observations. Just saluting my parents, and those others who fought.