World War II Memoirs from Canada by Stan Scislowski
By Stan Scislowski
Stan Scislowski, author of Not All of Us Were Brave, Editor of Royal Canadian
Legion Branch Newsletter for 40 years, joins us from Canada.
To view Stan’s book, please go to:Not All of Us Were Brave.
Stan is sharing some of his words, his memories with us. For today we join him with:
An Anniversary of Sorts
Fifty-five years have gone by since I stepped ashore in Greenock,
Scotland after arriving on April 14, 1945 from my service in Italy.
It's hard to believe that it was that many years ago. The war was
nearing its end, and although I didn't know it, I would spend yet
another eight months overseas, but it proved to be the most pleasant
period of my three and a half years service in the army.
At the time, it was only natural, that I'd be just a-busting to
get home, but as I look back on the last eight months period of my
army career, I'm glad I never did get on one of the early boats on its way to Canada. Those eight months had to be, without a doubt, the
happiest, most carefree, most enjoyable time I could have ever asked
or hoped for. Let me describe briefly what it was like and the feelings that went through me.
April and May in England of 1945 was a delightful succession of
bright, sunny days, the kind of Spring everyone looks forward to and revels in. As far as I was concerned, though most of my contemporaries
wouldn't agree, few are the ways in which one can experience
contentment and inner serenity than can compare to an unhurried walk
along shaded country lanes and across flower speckled meadows, even
for a virile young specimen of Canadian manhood as I was. I did just
that in the beautiful garden countryside of Surrey and Hampshire
counties. I found this out in the next three months or more as I went
about such a non-macho and mundane pursuit of pleasure.
Idyllic Spring days, followed by the ideal days of an equally
beautiful summer did more for me in my coming back down to earth from the stresses of battle than anything else I can think of. There's
something about communing with Nature that's better medicine for the
inner spirit than any potion a doctor can prescribe. The frequent walks and bike rides that took me through the leafy tunnel of the oak wood at Esher on my wanderings to here, there, and everywhere was a tonic for the stresses I'd been subjected to in the year and a half I spent in Italy. Shafts of sunlight piercing the upper foliage of the tall oaks danced on the black asphalt of the roadway; birds twittering and singing, hidden amidst the foliage somewhere high above me; the flowers in brilliant hues along the wood's edge; the soughing of the gentle breezes of Spring in the leaves above; all these awakened the spiring muse within me and I expressed myself in the way I felt through my writing. Many an evening I spent at the Underwood typewriter in the Repat. Depot Orderly Room (I was the runner) with no one around to bother me as I tapped away at the keys with two fingers,putting down on paper anything that came to mind. I wrote about what I had seen along the way on my frequent bicycle rides and meandering walks through the lovely Surrey and Hampshire countrysides, and even into Berkshire equally as lovely. I drew pictures in words describing the pastoral beauty of the fields, the farms, the canals, the country cottages. I wrote about the people I met or passed along the way. Anything that came to mind I scribbled first on little note-pads and then typed on letter-size sheets when I returned to camp. The scraps of paper on which my musings and observations were typed, have long since been lost to me, my friends, and the literary world. Deathless prose? Not likely. But whatever it was that I scribbled or typed, I like to think there had to be something there that might have been worth reading and ruminating over, or that those same thoughts and observations would have given a few moments of pleasure to me or to anyone else who enjoys such stuff. How I wish I still had those scraps of paper.
Often when it seemed I found
Goodness here, there, all around,
I saw, on closer scrutiny
The goodness come from inside me.
Why did the whole world seem to smile?
Because I laughed with it awhile.
Why was all earth so bright with sun?
Because my heart gave it one.
The past seems dear, the future right?
What was it set the day apart?
The peace of God within my heart.
Since then, when life looks dark and grim,
My assets small, my prospects dim,
I push dark thoughts back on the shelf
And seek for heaven in myself.
(author unknown)
As the saying goes nowadays; "I must have been some kind of a nut"
to spend my idle hours walking the fields and along back-country lanes
and grass-banked streams, while so many others were spending their
time and money getting looped-up on beer or ale in the local pubs or
chasing the skirted ones. That day would come for me, but not just
yet. Maybe I did seem kind of strange in their eyes. But I knew
different. I was no more strange than they were. There was a purpose
in those solitary walks, a becalming purpose, a celebration of my
coming back from all those days of miseries, of living a good part of
the time in holes in the ground, of enduring the cold rain and the
sleet and snow of northern Italian winters, followed by the sweltering
heat and dust of an Italian summer, and wallowing in the quagmires of
the rainy season of Fall. And of course, in my quiet way I celebrated
the fact that I survived the days of battle. I was at peace with
myself and the world.
Stan Scislowski
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