Grenades to Kindness

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This week in my novel, A Farewell to Arms, I am on page 120. Fred has been taking some down time with some new friends at the base he's at. The topic of discussion are the medals for the number of wounds one has. Fred makes the comment that he'd rather have wound medals than other war medals. Ettore showed his medals and his wounds. He was hit my a German hand grenade (or potato masher) that blew up his foot. As an officer, Ettore carried his rifle to blend in with regular soldiers so his rank didn't stand out making him an HVT. Simmons asked what it the German was like after Ettore had shot him. He remembers taking his rifle and shooting right back at the boy who threw the grenade. Hitting the kid right in the chest fearing he'd miss his head. But he didn't stay to watch.

In class we have been studying Confucianism. The class has read The Analects. Honestly I like the concept of Confucianism. The concepts of being courteous to one another and showing general kindness and respect for people is something that todays society has lost for the most part. I like how in The Analects knowledge is used for a greater understanding of things and not something just to attain a higher social status. "The Master said, In old days men studied for the sake of self-improvement, nowadays men study in order to impress other people." -Confucius. In relation to Confucianism I wish todays society still reflected that of the society of the 1940's and so on. Working at Fareway (local grocery store) where we are a courteous business its easy to see how generations have changed. When I help out older people they seem to be nicer with more converstaion. With younger people they are much shorter and could care less if I was helping them or not.