Daily Archives: February 10, 2006

Everything I Know About Love…

By Louise Knott Ahern

Everything I know about love, I learned from a letter my grandpa wrote to my grandma during World War II.

Darling,
Well, today is VE Day. I am glad that much is over… There is no celebrating here. We had a parade and several speeches today, but no shouting. Everyone is restricted to the post until things quiet down. I think everyone should wait and celebrate when the whole thing is done…

Henry “Hank” Shellenbarger was a big John Wayne of a man. A bomber pilot, the Army recruited him to teach others how to fly. Helen Mary Shellenbarger was a teacher – a college-educated woman far ahead of her time.

As I knew them, they were always old, always wise. Grandpa could take one look at the sky and tell you if it was going to snow that night. He could build or fix anything, including our first house. Grandma kept a stash of every grandchild’s favorite treat in her pantry. She had a saying for every situation, a collection of old colloquialisms she picked up in her youth. Most of the time, I had no idea what they meant, like when something got lost, it “went the way of the rug.”

When I got old enough to understand, I would beg Grandpa to tell me about the war. Was he a hero? Did he ever get hurt? Could I be a pilot, too? One day he answered with his silence. He got out of his well-worn rocking chair and went into his bedroom. A moment later, he came out, his hand closed tightly. He told me to hold out my hand, and I obeyed. In it, he placed a tarnished set of Army Air Corps wings.

“Now you can be a pilot,” he said.

It never occurred to me to ask Grandma about the war until college. I interviewed her for a history class term paper, and being a natural writer, I used her answers to craft a creative narrative of a woman struggling on the home front.

It wasn’t until after I discovered the letter in Grandma’s dresser drawer – neatly creased inside a yellowed envelope along with a single dog-tag – that I realized I had asked both of them all the wrong questions.

They are moving the whole engineering training school to some other field. We don’t know where for sure but it looks like Shepherd Field… Don’t worry. I will still be in the same program, just in a different place.

Grandpa died in June 1997. The day he passed, the entire family gathered at their home in the small farming town where I grew up. One by one, we filed into the bedroom, where he lay in a hospice bed, to say good-bye. And one by one, we all cried. But not Grandma. Not that day.

She didn’t cry in front of us until she viewed him for the first time in his casket. I hung back and watched as Grandma moved toward the front of the room. She stared for a moment and then reached out her hand. She placed hers over his. And then she began to cry.

“Oh my Hank, my Hank,” she sobbed.

Before my eyes, she was transformed. She wasn’t my grandma anymore, and he was no longer my grandpa. Instead, I saw them as they were fifty years earlier, a young couple passionately in love. A young couple about to be separated by war and distance.

I miss you and love you very much, sweetheart. I am glad we are going to have the baby. I guess I’ll read and go to sleep.
Forever Yours,
Hank

Today, I hang onto Grandpa’s wings and the letter. Grandma hangs on to his heart.

Louise Knott Ahern is a freelance journalist and public relations coach who writes contemporary romances. She’s the author of “Opting Out: A Career Woman’s Guide to Going Home Without Going Crazy,” a blog for mothers at www.optoutguide.blogspot.com. She is also a contributor to The Writer’s Vibe (www.thewritersvibe.typepad.com), a blog for professional writers.