Thursday, May 25, 2006
Let Those Winds Of Time Blow Over My Head
I've smudged out our last name. If you know me, you know me. If you don't, you don't.
So it's a little late for Mother's Day, but I just got this today. My Dad is visiting from Texas for a couple of days, and he bestowed upon me and Wayners when he got here a batch of old photos and memorabilia from our grandma's old stuff. She and Grandpa both headed into the mystic back in 1981, and Dad discovered this telegram in some of her old stuff a number of years after she died. He didn't know she had held on to it all those decades, and now, he's handing it on down to us.
Dad does not remember where he was at the time he sent this Mother's Day greeting to Grandma in May 1945, but it was somewhere in Europe. I'm guessing Belgium or Germany, since the Germans surrendered May 7, 1945. The telegram is dated May, 1945, but the actual date is on a crease and has become illegible over the past 61 years. The "sansorigine" return address was pretty standard during the war. It simply means "without origin," and was used so that German intelligence would not know exactly where it originated. I'm guessing it's a "canned" message. Soldiers probably sent out thousands just like it, changing only the names. At least, it doesn't sound like Dad's verbiage.
"Audrey" is a typo. Dad's first name is "Aubrey," which isn't much better. What the hell? Grandpa's real name was "Marion," and I guarantee you he was a man's man. Being a male named "Marion" doesn't make you girlie, just ask anybody who knew Marion Morrison.
Anyway, I thought this was pretty cool. Happy belated Mother's Day to all you Mom's out there, especially those with sons and daughters off in the military. They'll be fine, just like Dad was in WWII. Good thing, since neither Wayners nor I would be here otherwise. Then you'd have to read some really stupid blog.
