Sounds like we're related

My day was particularly uneventful yesterday until I got to my parents' house last night.

The package of documents we requested from the government has finally arrived. Inside were all the medical and service records on file for my father's paternal grandfather and my mother's grandfather from WWI, and I find them fascinating.

We knew a lot about my mother's grandfather, Philip, already. He was one of those bastards that got conscripted against his will two months before the end of the war and got to do some of the cleanup afterward. He didn't talk about it much but forever afterward the sight of stew, ground meat and cracked eggs used to make him vomit.

But Vic? I know the old man hated his father for leaving his wife and seven children in a dirt-floored shack in rural Burnaby with no means of support while he fucked off to the war for King and Country. He came home, was unemployed for several months because there were no jobs for people who had fought in the war. When he finally got a job, he died in a work accident on his second day of work. That's about it.

The rest of that story is history, which I'll have to tell at another time.

What's interesting right now is that this week is the anniversary of the Canadian victory at Vimy Ridge in France and the "return to Vimy weekend" on the CBC. Quite a big thing, Vimy Ridge. That and the War of 1812.

Mom summarized the hilights before plopping the stack of papers in front of me: "Certified for lorry operation, no medals, disciplined for drunkenness, theft of public property, AWOL once, tested twice for syphilis, treated for influenza and a lot of dental stuff."

"So, in other words we're related?"

"Yep."