The book of Unknown Americans: a Novel
“Not long after we were married, I enlisted in the navy. I always wanted to do something heroic. With the navy, I traveled to Vietnam, Grenada, the Persian Gulf, and Bosnia. I was injured in Bosnia, which requires me to use a walker now. But I came home. I came home. And that is all any soldier cares about.
I love the esoteric things in life. My father used to call me an aesthete. He meant it not as a compliment, of course. He was disappointed by my interests and by the fact that they were not t...he same as his, which were farming and raising livestock. He believed a man should work hard with his hands, that toil and sweat were evidence of a virtuous life. He did not appreciate that I wanted to read books and that I saved money to buy an easel when I turned fifteen and that I would spend the afternoons painting pictures of trees. The only time he was proud of me, in fact, was when I joined the navy. He was an old man by then, nearing death, but I still remember his face when I told him, the way he had smiled with those teeth of his that were brown around the edges, the way the wrinkles rippled up to the surface of his cheeks.MoreLess
I love the esoteric things in life. My father used to call me an aesthete. He meant it not as a compliment, of course. He was disappointed by my interests and by the fact that they were not t...he same as his, which were farming and raising livestock. He believed a man should work hard with his hands, that toil and sweat were evidence of a virtuous life. He did not appreciate that I wanted to read books and that I saved money to buy an easel when I turned fifteen and that I would spend the afternoons painting pictures of trees. The only time he was proud of me, in fact, was when I joined the navy. He was an old man by then, nearing death, but I still remember his face when I told him, the way he had smiled with those teeth of his that were brown around the edges, the way the wrinkles rippled up to the surface of his cheeks.MoreLess
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