Book Club

Monday
One of our friends from church invited Roger and I to the meeting of her book club this evening. They had been reading The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, and knowing that Roger was born and brought up on Guernsey, she asked if he would give a little talk on the island, and I went along too, with some of the photographs I took on our last visit, two years ago. The book, written as a series of letters, is based in Guernsey during the German Occupation in World War II. Part of what Roger talked about was his Dad's experience - as he, together with his other four school age siblings were evacuated to England. Two older siblings, who were already out of school remained on the island. Roger's Dad was about 13 at the time, and wouldn't see his parents again for four years. It wasn't a very good experience for him and his brothers, as they weren't treated very well by their host family (the two girls went to a different family). It also seems rather ironic, as they were living not far from Liverpool, which of course received quite a lot of bombing - so it seems somewhat like going from the frying pan into the fire. His Dad has always found it very difficult to talk about his experience. Several times when our children were still in school they would have genealogy projects to do, often requiring an interview with a grandparent. If they tried talking to Bernard, it usually ended up with him becoming too emotional to talk. In recent years, however, he seems to be a little more at ease. When we were over in Guernsey two years ago and visiting with Roger's Uncle Barry we were interested to read some of the Red Cross letters which the children had sent from England to their parents. Of course the letters were only short and were censored, so the content was somewhat superficial. Anyway, it was a very enjoyable evening, hearing the thoughts of the others who had read the book, and they in turn were very interested and sometimes surprised by what Roger had to say - for example they were amazed to hear how small the island is.

One year ago: Lines and shapes