Keep telling the stories

CBS News posted this brief news item on Facebook: "World War II codebreaker Julia Parsons died last month at 104 years old. She was part of an all-woman team unscrambling messages to and from German submarines."

When I was a kid, a common topic of adult conversation involved things that happened "during the war." Mostly they talked about everyday things that happened on the home front, like where they lived, who they knew, how they used gas ration cards, that sort of thing, as if it happened yesterday. I was fascinated by those stories, and it prompted me to learn everything could about WWII. Today there's almost nobody left to tell those tales. 

The last civil war soldier died in 1956, at age 106, just three years before I was born. We think about the civil war as ancient 19th century history, but many people who were there lived through the first half of the 20th century. 

Lately I've encountered several young people who are very interested in 1960s culture. Probably because their grandparents talked about it. They seem to enjoy hearing stories of my experiences growing up in those days.  

What I'm trying to say is keep telling the stories. Keep them alive as long as you can. No matter how mundane they may seem to you, they provide insights into the past for the new generations and gives them a frame of reference to understand how we got to where we are today.