Tara laChance<\/p>\n
June 7, 2015<\/p>\n
Memory essay add-ons<\/p>\n
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(Insert page 8, 2nd<\/sup> paragraph)<\/p>\n Hermine offered almost no details regarding her American GI husband other than that she was madly in love with him.\u00a0 In the article, The Sexual Behavior of American GIs during the Early Years of the Occupation of Germany<\/u> by John Willoughby, the author paints a not-so-pretty picture about the behavior of the American soldiers towards the Germany women.\u00a0 He speaks of the policies of the Army at that time, quoting, \u201cThe policy is just to give the brass the first crack at all the good looking women.\u201d\u00a0 The first crack?\u00a0 That doesn\u2019t sound very respectful to me.\u00a0 I wonder how the meeting between Hermine and her husband came about and if her age and naivet\u00e9 factored in to her eventual marriage. Fraternization was frowned upon, according to the article, yet many American men came home with German wives.\u00a0 How did that occur? More questions\u2026<\/p>\n <\/p>\n (Insert page 1, after \u201cThis is her story.\u201d)<\/p>\n From the article, \u2018You\u2019d stand in line to buy potato peelings\u2019:\u00a0 German women\u2019s memories of World War II<\/u>, by Gail Hickey.\u00a0 \u201cMore than six decades after the end of World War II, the dead cannot tell their stories; many remaining survivors are in ill health or are too traumatized to recount their war memories.\u201d\u00a0 I hope that my curiosity about Hermine\u2019s past gives her a form of healing.\u00a0 She doesn\u2019t let on that she was traumatized by the events of her childhood during the war but I can\u2019t imagine how she could not be.\u00a0 She spoke about the fact that she worked in her foster-parents\u2019 restaurant and it sounded almost like her saving grace because she didn\u2019t have to experience hunger like other people of that time period.\u00a0 But, like Hickey mentions, \u201cThe government counted on women \u2018to make up deficiencies in diet, clothing and comfort brought about by war\u2019.\u201d\u00a0 Hermine was a young girl, and those are big responsibilities for a young girl.\u00a0 This is yet another thing she and I have in common.\u00a0 My mother left my father when I was only 12 and I was left to be his counselor, companion and to grow up way too soon.\u00a0 These roles are not meant to be taken on by young girls.\u00a0 These are for grown women who have had the opportunity to grow up in due time.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n (Insert page 6, after the second paragraph)<\/p>\n In the book, Behind the Lines<\/u>, by Margaret Higonnet, she recalls a woman\u2019s memory of the bombings, which she describes as having \u201ca dreamlike quality\u201d.\u00a0 These defense mechanisms that are brain uses to create memories that are bearable for us to recollect.\u00a0 It creates a sense of uncertainty in me, about the few childhood memories that I possess.\u00a0 Are they valid, accurate? Does it matter?\u00a0 Our mind attempts to protect us in order to keep us alive.\u00a0 If changing traumatic memories into dreamlike recollections is what needs to happen for us to be able to function in our daily lives, then so be it. Whatever it takes.\u00a0 Higonnet says, \u201cMemories are constantly being recreated; there is no \u2018original\u2019 and therefore accurate memory.\u201d (pg. 288) In my opinion, whatever comes up, and however it chooses to be expressed, is exactly the right thing in that moment.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Tara laChance June 7, 2015 Memory essay add-ons (Insert page 8, 2nd paragraph) Hermine offered almost no details regarding her American GI husband other than that she was madly in love with him. In the article, The… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1114,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1114"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/losttime\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}