[typ550]

Over the years, I have not always seen eye-to-eye with my dad (who turned 88 this year), but I have a lot of respect for his service in the ETO, particularly the time he spent in the Huertgen Forest (also known as the Death Factory). I have had the opportunity to visit the Huertgen a couple of times now, most recently with a WWII Wehrmacht veteran serving as a tour guide, and there is something very powerful in seeing these places firsthand and standing in those foxholes. I've been to a couple of specific locations where my dad was nearly killed and it's a strange feeling to know you might not be standing there yourself if a bullet or shell fragment had gone in a slightly different direction. Also a little surreal to be picking up a sackful of shrapnel that had been just lying around for the sixty years that had passed since he was there.

I wish Dad was in good enough health to go back for a visit; he always talked about doing it and now that I can afford to take him, he can't physically manage it.