Battles with no end

As an average citizen in my plus-70 years, I am thoroughly shaken by the news that suicides of soldiers have reached a high of nearly three decades.

A memory of my growing-up years  during World War II is that whenever  mamma heard that a local boy was drafted, she stopped whatever she was doing and said a prayer. These prayers were offered to keep him safe in battle. My whole family remembers Teddy Kramarczyk, a  Polish-American boy who lived upstairs, who was drafted and killed in battle. When boys like him  returned from the war, we all said a prayer of thanksgiving.

It never occurred to us that their service and sacrifice were not over. The greatest ordeal was yet to come: the battle of survival after returning home. Seeing the horror of war, and men being blown up before your eyes, are not forgettable experience; it comes to haunt you. When a veteran readjusts to ordinary life, and puts the memories of war behind him, he will survive. But when he can’t and points the gun at himself, we realize we have not won the battle. We are also the losers.