Green army men for Veterans Day

On October eighteenth one of my superiors paid the library a visit.  She brought with her the usual friendly chatter and monthly fliers for Story Hour, but she also brought this box.

The box invites patrons to take a little man home with them as a reminder to pray for those serving the country.  It also provides an opportunity to share photographs of any veteran friends or family members that the patrons might have.

Wait a minute...little man?  Yes, when it first came the box was full of one of my favorite childhood toys, green army men!

Well, green and tan army men.  When Daddy was a pup back in the fifties and sixties these were strictly dark green, hence their nickname.  Now there are tan ones too.  I also remember reading about these army men coming in goofy-looking fluorescent colors at one time, but those apparently went over like a lead balloon.

Oh, I never did tell y'all that I loved little plastic men when I was a little kid, did I?  I didn't really have many green army men, except for a few that Daddy saved from his childhood.  No, I mostly had cowboys, Indians, and pirates.  The cowboys and Indians came in these huge bags of about fifty or so pieces, and were molded from yellow, red, and green plastic.  The molding was a bit crude, with some of the pieces having big flaps of extra plastic hanging off, but that bothered me not.  The pirates were a Christmas gift and were a bit nicer, being molded in opaque red, black, yellow, and white plastic with no extra tabs hanging off.  Oh, what fun I had with my little plastic men!  I kept them in a wicker basket and whiled away many an evening after preschool playing with my little figures.  For old time's sake and because I like the sentiment behind my boss's idea, I picked up an army man of my own, this belly-crawling tan man with a rifle.

I named him "Floyd."  Don't ask why.  Coworker B also picked a belly-crawler in the traditional green, and Yours Truly came up with the idea to make him into a keychain!

I may do this for Floyd eventually too.  I haven't decided yet.  Right now Floyd is on active duty, resting on Ju-hwang's rather ample wig and waiting for some big bad cat to come climbing up onto my shelf.  Please ignore Momoko, who insisted on photobombing.

As I insinuated above military men go back a long way in my family.  My grandfather is the one I tend to remember since he was the only one I knew, though by virtue of some boring genealogy study I can verify that I had family members who fought in the Civil War, some for the North and some for the South.  I don't have a hard copy of Grandpa in his uniform, but I do have a picture that I copied from Mama's FB page...complete with a stupid frame that FB currently has available.

Mama says that he'd just had four shots (two in each arm) and was subsequently running a fever when this picture was taken.  Anywho, Grandpa was an engineer in the army, working for water purification.  I think I also remember Mama saying that he helped blow up enemy bridges so that the trains couldn't travel...I'll have to ask her again if that part's true or not.  EDIT:  yes, it turns out that Grandpa did help blow up bridges, but there was more to it than that.  His division would first BUILD a bridge for his platoon to cross, then they'd purify the water for the platoon to drink.  After the platoon was safely across, it would be the job of Grandpa's team to blow the bridge up so the enemy couldn't follow.  Pretty neat, actually.

Regarding the personal aspect, Grandpa reported that he saw a great many things that were either fascinating or terrible, with one particular memory haunting him to his dying day.  He was driving a large truck through a small German town, and he had strict orders from his superiors not to stop for anything.  Lo and behold, this random old man comes out on his bicycle, directly in front of Grandpa's truck.  He didn't respond to Grandpa's frantic horn-beeping, and he subsequently got hit by the back of the truck as it passed.  Grandpa wasn't certain if he killed the cyclist or just injured him, but he knows for a fact that he hit the cyclist.  In his sideview mirror he saw the unoccupied bicycle go flying, and he also saw a female pedestrian gasping in horror.  Since he was under orders not to stop he never found out what the final outcome of the incident was, but it bothered him the rest of his life.

There were other stories, of course, stories that I may share some other time since they're pretty interesting, but that'll at least give y'all a taste of what it was like in the military during WWII.  Modern-day soldiers have it a little better with their updated equipment and social media to allow them to stay connected with loved ones, but it's still a dirty job that they choose to do voluntarily.  That voluntary aspect is another improvement, come to think of it; as recently as the Vietnam War men were being drafted.  By the way, fun fact:  my grandfather was not drafted.  He chose to enter the military voluntarily so that he could choose the branch he wanted.  Those who got drafted didn't get to choose, if what I've read and been told is correct.  But regardless, being in the military is a tough, dirty, dangerous job, one that I know I'd never be tough enough to do.  In fact, even military folks who aren't in active combat face danger during certain parts of their jobs, as parts of The Hot Zone will reveal.  So if you know anyone who has served or is serving in the military, take some time to day to thank them, and if you're the praying type, to follow my boss's advice and pray for them.  They need that appreciation now more than ever, when the lamestream oops, did I say that out loud?  The MAINstream media seems to delight in vilifying the military...until the country actually NEEDS the military.  So thank a veteran today if you can, and pray for the ones that are still serving.

God bless America,
RagingMoon1987