Two Dolls

I was a little girl in the early 1950's when my big brother Dean left for Korea and Japan. He was in the Air Force and went to Korea where a war was being fought. I didn't really understand the meaning of war but I remember my mother crying one day when she received Dean's will in the mail. I think writing a will was a normal part of a soldier's preparation for going overseas during war time but I'm sure it felt terrible to a mother to recognize the meaning of this document.

As part of Dean's Air Force assignment, he also spent some time in Japan. He was gone a couple of years but thankfully he safely returned home. I remember the day when he got off the Greyhound bus in front of our house.

My brother Jack was fifteen and Dean was fourteen when I was born. They left home to go to college before I even started kindergarten. They were both very important to me and I was always overjoyed when they were home. I followed them everywhere they went, talking to them, and probably being a pest.

Jack was in the Navy and brought me dolls from European countries that he visited. Dean brought me the Japanese doll that you can see in the above picture. I still have all my dolls and love them still. When I met little Sachiho, my students' beautiful child in the picture, I recognized my childhood doll had come to life.