Caroline spotted this young man strolling through the park and was struck by his leisurely manner compared to the fathers (mostly alone) pushing one, two and sometimes three children in a frenzy of rush and disorder.I had been stuck with an 87 year old with many war stories to tell. He relived for me the terrifying image of standing look out on the deck of a merchant vessel bound for Archangel for two hour watches with the temperature at minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit waiting to be torpedoed by a U-boat. "You'd last less than five minutes in those waters."
I caught up with them and made my excuses . "You've got to listen to stories like that, haven't you," the youth said, "You can't just walk away and say you've got an appointment."
We were looking for a background and my subject said, "What about the red wood we just past."
My father was a merchant seaman who sailed in those waters. He told me the same stories. He was born at Baltimore in 1919 and would have been three years older than your acquaintance.
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