Veterans DayA Story by JoshiDxMemories of my great-grandfather.Today I was
given four packets of Fig Newtons. I’ve heard they are an acquired taste, and I
suppose that would explain why no one wanted the rest of them. Personally I
love them, though not as much for the taste as for what they mean to me. You
see every time I bite into one of those sweet little cookies-without-crumbs it
takes me back, back to when I had one sister, back to when I lived on Wellington
Place, back to when the world was so much bigger yet so much simpler all the same. One bite takes me back to a small house in Pennsylvania where a strawberry patch was grown and the maple syrup was made from the trees outside. My parents had
a blue Nissan Sentra back then. We used to take long drives to visit family,
much longer drives than we take now. Sometimes we’d go to the mountainous
country of West Virginia and other times we’d head north up towards the very
edge of Pennsylvania, stopping just before we hit New York. It was up in
Bradford, a dying oil town famous for its Zippo lighters, when we would visit my
dad’s mother, and in turn her father. Those were the most special trips of all. My
great-grandfather was an Army vet who reenlisted after Pearl Harbor in 1942. He
was also a writer and a storyteller who loved recounting the events of his days
as a soldier. I still remember sitting with my parents around his small kitchen
table, listening to him as he shared his stories. He would tell of storming the
beaches of Normandy on D-Day and how his boat was hit on the way in. He would also tell of
liberating a concentration camp, and fighting in the Battle of the Bulge. Each
time we went I would inevitably get hungry, and as these stories were
told my great-grandfather would offer me a Fig Newton. Usually I’d accept and sit by the table, eating my treat and listening to him talk. I remember a
lot of things about his house and the times we spent there. But of all the
things I associate with it there are none I remember better than the Fig
Newtons, not even that sweet homemade maple syrup.
Something about that cookie just brings me back, and all of a sudden I’m
sitting in that kitchen again listening to a great person tell tales of
heroics and bravery. I’m not even sure I like the cookies anymore, but I don’t really care. For me there’s nothing like a Fig Newton to make a perfect Veterans Day. © 2016 JoshiDx |
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1 Review Added on November 11, 2010 Last Updated on November 11, 2016 Tags: Veteran's Day, relatives, army, Normandy, D-Day, Fig Newton, Bradford, Battle of the Bulge AuthorJoshiDxIcelandAboutI decided to break down and write something here. Too bad I don't know what to say. What's there to know about someone who doesn't exist? Even if words capture the essence we are still at a loss for w.. more..Writing
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