#warletters

Lt. Giulio Gualerzi writes home amid bombings, “Pippo” in the sky, and an Italy divided by war. A powerful personal voice inside History. 🔗 Read more: https://www.tildosacchinischool.it/archivio-sacchini/giulio-gualerzi-5-settembre-1944/

👉 https://www.tildosacchinischool.it/archivio-sacchini/elizabeth-meyer-28-ottobre-1943/

There is rage like I never knew before. Rage over the tiniest, slightest triggers. Who is this person? I often ask myself. Where did all this come from? Of course, like many others before me and many more after me, I blame the war I came out from. I am not the same person anymore—or more accurately, there are two people warring inside me: one, the pre-war man I was and the man I desperate want to be again—a good provider to my family and loving husband and father who loved to joke around and who enjoyed Super Bowl and a few cold ones as much as the next man—and two, the post-war person—or shell—I have become. Sometimes, I try so hard to stop the post-war persona to take over, but I end up depressed for days and days. Why? I guess, war does that to you. No matter how hard you trained and how prepared you thought you were, nothing prepares you for war. Not in that sense any way. After all, how do you really prepare to take lives when you haven’t killed as much as a squirrel in your life? How do you prepare to pull the trigger and ignore the pleas of the enemy begging for his life? Sure, you’d barely understand the language, but there is no mistaking the horror in the eyes of a man about to die. That look will haunt you no matter how tight you shut your eyes. In fact, you see even better, like you are back in real-life action, when you close your eyes. You see blood and gore, you see defenceless women and children sprawled on streets—collateral damage of a war they never asked for—and you see yourself, acting hero-like and God-like, dispensing death to enemies you never knew you had until now. When I am in this state­, I take whatever ray of sunshine—memory, encouragement, prayer—to make it back to the person I am now. I guess, I can never be truly the man I was before, but I try to make peace with the man I am now and thank Divine Providence for being here. Some of us military men and women lose so much more. Some make it out alive, like I did, but have no family or girlfriend or fiancée to return to. Some, without family and source of income, become homeless. Some just lose their marbles. Where’s the sense in getting out alive? At night, after saying my prayers where I ask absolution, I go over a list I made years ago—the whys of going to war: my family and their security, justice, world peace, America. After that, I count my blessings. I think I’m pretty blessed the way I am today. Sometimes I count and count and count blessings until I surrender to sleep. The sleep gods sometimes take pity on me and let me know peace in my sleep. Tomorrow, I’ll try again to rise from the ashes. Read the full article

Forget Me Not handoff to director @lisalalaludwig #ww2 #warletters #family #playwright #workshopreading #mannyfriednewplayworkshop 📻🕰✉️🔫🌨💪🏼 (at Road Less Traveled Productions)