During a morning walk with Junior I met a tiny man sporting a baseball cap with the words “WWII VET.” I couldn’t resist asking about his cap when he stopped to look at the sleeping baby.

He had some good stories to tell, but if only I had asked him ten years earlier.

He signed up with the service “until the war was over” and spent “some years” in the South Pacific: Iwo Jima and Okinawa. It was “all us young guys” and “we didn’t have enough food to eat but we did it.”

The Japanese soldiers “were passionate, battle-hardened soldiers because they were fighting for their homeland.” We Americans “never took it too seriously, always looking for the next bar to get drunk.”

I wanted to know more. “Did you see action?”

“Oh yes and I have my papers right here,” and he’d dig into a pocket, reveal a wallet, fumble with it, then put it back, puzzled. “I have all my papers at home. All of it.”

There was more I asked but stopped the third time he pulled out his wallet and repeated the search for papers that weren’t there. He might have the answers to all my questions but his memory wasn’t cooperating. Finally, he smiled and said he’d see me again soon as he shuffled off.

The scariest thing about old age is losing lucidity.

World War Two vets are special. They fought for freedom at a time in history that will never be repeated. There were no computers, no jet engines, and no nuclear bomb until the very end. Battles were won with “true grit” and the equipment was the last of its kind before “high-tech” took us into a new frontier.

Almost romantic… Where pilots actually flew the planes, manned belly turrets, and wore thick flight suits in uncompressed cabins. Tanks crawled across the field with simple mirrors and glass for targeting. Ships vollyed artillery, hit-or-miss, as they determined the proper range and angle.

What’s my point? About 1,000 vets of WW2 die every day which means a piece of history which created the The Cold War, NATO, North Korea, and the Israel/Palestine conflict. There’s something to be learned here before it’s gone forever.

So talk to your grandparents about their youth, the War. Bring a tape recorder or camcorder for longevity because old age isn’t just about dying. It creeps up on you as the mind gets foggy as lucidity slips away. It’s not about losing the present, but one’s own past.

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