THE FIGHTING FIRST LADY!

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.



Well-worn suitcase in hand, her Red Cross uniform snug and no-nonsense, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt Roosevelt, forever known as Eleanor, and as she requests to be known to me, clip-clops in her stubby-heeled pumps to the airplane that will fly us from Washington, D.C. to San Francisco, California. I would offer to unburden her of her suitcase, but I have learned that she would ignore my request. She is a self-sufficient soul—thoughtful to the extreme. She would deem surrendering her suitcase to me as an affront to my dignity as a human being, even though I serve as her assistant and helper on this trip. That her life has been one of wealth and privilege since its inception is not easily reconciled with the person I have come to know. Coddled she is not, nor does she wish it to be the case.

            Once again, she is going where her husband cannot go—he cannot go for the reason of his physical limitations, and because of the demands of his office as President of the United States of America. At this exact moment, he is at the war-planning conference in Quebec, Canada with Great Britain’s Prime Minister, Winston S. Churchill. The trip will give the First Lady the opportunity to meet troops stationed on remote islands cut off from their loved-ones. In this way, she will act as a surrogate for the mothers across the land, both to bring comfort to the troops and to their mothers to whom she will report in her newspaper column, My Day.

San Francisco is our first stop on this steamy afternoon of August 17, 1943, and is the inauguration of our secret, six-week-long, twenty-five thousand miles journey into the dangerous war-zone of the South Pacific. Eleanor is not cavalier about the possible peril facing us. She wears no jewelry, having stored it away safely back home with instructions as to its distribution lest she never returns. I am breathless from her courage. Admiration of her fills me from stem to stern.

From America’s west coast, we ride the wind across the Pacific in an all-night flight, landing mid-morning in Honolulu, Hawaii, at Hickam Field. This place so near to Pearl Harbor is the portal of the anguish of America’s plunge into World War II, wrought by Japan’s attack on the American Fleet there. The base as well as aircraft at Hickam, parked wingtip to wingtip to guard against sabotage on that fateful December 7^th morning not two years ago, were also heavily damaged or destroyed. Nevertheless, the airfield has been in non-stop use since then. Viewing bullet holes and other artifacts of the attack on surviving structures is not an item on our agenda, and we press on three and one-half hours later to our initial South Pacific destination. I am not an easy flier and I busy myself with writing in my trip’s log to avoid the view outside the aircraft’s windows. “Bear in mind that the log you keep of the trip will be of great interest to me and will influence the war’s policy, no doubt,” the president said to me before he left for Quebec. I struggle to regain my equilibrium when we touch down on Christmas Island.  

The war in the Pacific stretches from the Aleutian Islands off the coast of Alaska to Australia, 6,600 miles of contested ocean in between. Our trip will concentrate on visiting Allied forces in New Zealand and Australia as well as copious time spent island hopping to call on troops. There are seventeen Pacific islands on our schedule, their melodic names spanning half of the alphabet. The initial seven are Christmas, Penhryn, Bora Bora, Aitutaki, Tutuliua Samoa, Fiji, and New Caledonia, all to be visited during six whirlwind days. Our welcome at Christmas Island is chilly and officious. U.S. Admiral William “Bull” Halsey is visibly impatient and put-off by our presence. He has a war to fight and visits by “do-gooders” are nothing but a nuisance, as well as expensive in terms of resources required to meet their agendas. This is not to mention the extra security required to keep them out of harm’s way—an impossible task in actuality. The fighting does not stop because the First Lady of the United States of America has come to town. In fact, were it known, the fighting would intensify. Eleanor and I do not escape the admiral’s displeasure.

 “Whirlwind” is an understatement in describing Eleanor. Within our twelve hours on Christmas Island, she inspects two Navy hospitals, an officer’s rest house a boat-ride away, returns and inspects an Army hospital, reviews her son James’ former Marine battalion, delivers a speech at a service club, attends a reception, and is the guest of honor at a dinner given by General Harmon. Even Admiral Halsey said, “…I marveled at her hardihood, both physical and mental. She walked for miles, and saw new patients who were grievously and gruesomely wounded. But I marveled most at their expressions as she leaned over them. It was a sight I will never forget.” She talks to the wounded, touches them, and shows them her sincere interest and concern. The admiral apologizes to her for his crustiness upon our arrival, and expresses his gratitude to her for what she has done for his men. This is a sampling of the schedule she keeps throughout the entire trip, and its impact.

In her My Day newspaper column, she describes her visit to Bora Bora: “I went through the hospital, saw the Red Cross man, the headquarters building, tents, and mess hall and day room and outdoor theater in a colored troop area. There seems to be no trouble anywhere out here between the white and colored. They lie in beds in the same wards, go to the same movies and sit side by side and work side by side, but I don’t think I’ve seen them mess together, but their food is as good and everything just as clean in their quarters. Southern and Northern Negroes are in the same outfits.” Civil rights, both for women and colored citizens, is one of Eleanor’s passions. She fights tirelessly for their equality in education, housing, employment, and voting as basic human rights. Her stance is that the status of civil rights in a country is the litmus test of its strength as a democracy. Her efforts to have our military fully integrated have been thwarted, but she will not give up, if I know her.

Eleanor can never be accused of being a chameleon. Expediency holds no store with her. What you see with Eleanor is what you get. By the end of the trip she is thirty pounds thinner and the new best friend of thousands of Allied troops and their families, a triumph of loving, kinetic energy over discord and despair.©

Note: the above is a work of historical fiction based on actual events.



Images: Mrs. Roosevelt visits World War II troops in the Pacific Theater.



Recommended Reading: Eleanor Roosevelt’s My Day newspaper columns are available for view at online web sites.



Books by Linda Lee Greene are available for purchase in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com and by request at other booksellers.

“VICTORY HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH JUSTICE.”

 By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.



“Victory has nothing to do with justice,” noted author George Orwell in reference to the power of the imagination to rise above physical hardship and to find hope in living. This writer sees in it a fitting association with Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), President of the United States before and during World War II. Historians and biographers of FDR have noted the president’s almost supernatural optimism against the worst of odds, and his uncanny serenity when all around him unceasing tempests raged. Whether or not he was born with those facilities we do not know. But certainly, latent or not, he earned them in coming to terms with polio that struck him in his prime, the affliction that could not be cured, and that derailed what was regarded as his route in the upward trajectory of his career, as well as his life.  

Jaunty and eager behind the steering wheel of his Jeep, Mrs. Roosevelt and his closet personal advisor, Harry Hopkins accompanying him, FDR was parked at the entrance of the long drive that gained access to Hyde Park, his family retreat in Upstate New York. He awaited the arrival of Prime Minister of Great Britain, Winston S. Churchill and his daughter, Mary. In just a few balmy August, 1943 days, the president and the prime minister would convene a war-plans conference in Quebec, Canada. This sojourn at Hyde Park was a short getaway prior to the intense work that faced them. Exhausted from the journey to Canada from England several days before, Mrs. Churchill remained in Quebec, ensconced at the Citadelle, Great Britain’s King George VI’s residence that ranged a high cliff above the St. Lawrence River.

Convinced of the power of his personality to influence the outcome of World War II and subsequent world affairs, FDR was flushed with anticipation at hobnobbing with his British friend once more. Mr. Churchill was similarly as strong in ego and opinion as was Mr. Roosevelt. How fascinating it would have been to have had an ear in on their discussions. Mary’s noncommittal assessment of them was summed up in seven words: “Papa and he (FDR) are an interesting contrast.”

It did Mrs. Roosevelt’s heart good to see her husband so thoroughly energized by the company of his two friends, as well as the prospect of the conference. Mr. Roosevelt was often quite worn down by his immense responsibilities—much more so than in earlier days of his long presidency. Encouraging his good mood, Mrs. Roosevelt set her agenda to coincide with the Churchill’s visit and joined her husband as solicitous and sunny hosts to their guests. Their lengthy marriage had narrowed in its conjugal aspects. Incompatibility in their personalities and infidelity and maybe simply attrition had altered its character, but still there was genuine friendship, devotion, coupled with a sincere eagerness for each other’s happiness and purpose. And of course, both of them were consummate patriots and would do whatever their country called upon them to do.

Mr. Roosevelt had given up fighting his leg braces and wheelchair and Mrs. Roosevelt had ceased battling to stay in the role appointed to her by tradition. She had moved beyond her position as a wife and mother, and in her case, her mother-in-law’s compliant daughter-in-law. She had stepped forward when her husband was struck down. She had learned to be his legs, his voice, and his heart in the public realm, and in the process, had found her own true self, and once found, she was not about to relinquish it! If she could no longer occupy his bedroom, she took to showing up in his office, or at table when he took his meals, or wherever she could gain access to his ear, because now, she had ideas and opinions of her own. And there in one of the new roles she carved out for herself in their marriage, she laid her concerns about the country at her husband’s feet. It was well known that he received her graciously and with interest and was inclined to accept her views, on occasion. He was more tight-lipped with her, though. As put forth by Mary in her book CLEMENTINE CHURCHILL, the Biography of a Marriage, because Mrs. Roosevelt traveled so much and made copious speeches, as well as wrote a daily newspaper column, Mr. Roosevelt was afraid she would forget and let something “secret,” slip out.      

While Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt and Mr. and Mrs. Churchill bore much in common: all of them hailed from the aristocracy of their nations; they were all classically educated and erudite; they were the leaders of their countries; and the thirty-eight-year Roosevelt marriage was prolific in the number of children it had brought into the world, as was the long marriage of the Churchill’s. The prime minister and his wife were soon to celebrate their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary.

With all their similarities, they couldn’t have been more different, however, and possibly most notably, in the nature of their marriages. The chasm between the Roosevelts was not a factor in the Churchill relationship. Mrs. Churchill never had a cause nor a desire to find fulfillment outside her marriage. Projects held no interest for her. Her husband was her project for the entirety of their nearly six decades together. Shared with readers by their daughter in the above noted book, Mr. Churchill said to his wife on the occasion of their thirty-fifth anniversary, “I love you more and more each year.”

Conditions within the borders of both the United States and Great Britain were dicey. Domestic politics was a tangled web for Mr. Roosevelt, and the Nazi threat was only a narrow body of water separate from Mr. Churchill’s island nation of Great Britain. Its cities were being bombed and its people maimed or dying. But word from the battlefields of the war was encouraging. The Germans and Italians were routed from North Africa. Sicily was well on its way to being conquered. The Allied assault on the mainland of Italy was on the near horizon. In North Africa, American troops were training for that impending campaign. Mussolini and his Fascist Italian government were toppled and a new and friendly government was in its place. Russia, the Allied partner, was on the offensive against Germany in the east. The Nazi submarine menace in the Atlantic was reduced severely. The Allies had destroyed nearly one-third of German U-boats at sea. In the Pacific Theater, the United States had turned back the Japanese at Midway, Guadalcanal, and the Solomon Islands. The tide was changed in both the European and Pacific Theaters of the war in the Allies’ favor.

Both Mrs. Roosevelt and Mrs. Churchill knew that the realities could, and more than likely would, wreck the best-laid plans, on the battlefield, and elsewhere. There was no better teacher in life of that fact than marriage to a politician. Both of their husbands were high with accomplishment and heady with their power. In their unique ways, both women sought to shield their husbands from their inevitable emotional crash when bad news filtered in. For the moment though, the four of them were content in the status quo—once again, and in particular, events were bearing out Mr. Roosevelt’s supernatural optimism. He had a vision of himself in his soul, and despite his broken body and improbable route to his stake as the 20^th century’s greatest US President and one of the greatest persons of his time, he brought his vision into being.©

Note: the above is a work of historical fiction based on actual events.



Image: Franklin Delano Roosevelt on the campaign trail.



Recommended Reading:

CLEMENTINE CHURCHILL, the Biography of a Marriage by Mary [Churchill] Soames.

A DAUGHTER’S TALE by Mary [Churchill] Soames.

THE ROOSEVELT PRESENCE, The Life and Legacy of FDR by Patrick J. Maney.



Books by Linda Lee Greene are available for purchase in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com and by request at other booksellers.

IF RMS QUEEN MARY’S WALLS COULD TALK!

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.

August 5, 1943, anchored at the River Clyde, Glasgow, Scotland, RMS Queen Mary awaited the arrival of Great Britain’s Prime Minister, Winston Spencer Churchill and his staff of over two hundred and another fifty Royal Marine orderlies. Nearly nine years earlier, named for and christened by Mary of Teck, the wife of the British Empire’s King George V, the grand ship and the distinguished prime minister were well acquainted. Q.M. had received him onboard her decks before. Four years into the Second World War, the former greatest ocean liner in the world, plying the North Atlantic for the pleasure of the rich and famous, and the wannabe  rich and famous, was commissioned in her new call to service as a troop carrier. Transporting 15,000 troops per trip and traveling at 30 knots, she was the largest and fastest troop carrier sailing. In no way did she resemble her former glamorous self, for her luxurious Art Deco interiors were removed and stored away, her exterior lights extinguished, and her portholes shrouded. In addition, she was painted camouflage grey, which earned her the moniker: Grey Ghost. At sea, she looked like a grey whale on steroids. At war’s end, she would be retrofitted to her former glory, resuming her career as an ocean liner, service she was to provide for nearly two decades more. Upon her retirement, her illustrious and legendary career would be exulted in anew in her guise as a posh hotel and museum at Long Beach, California, USA. Listed on the ship’s log as “Colonel Warden,” Mr. Churchill and his flock boarded her that day in August, 1943 as the Grey Ghost.

Her Sun Deck, formerly a source of pleasurable entertainment and relaxation was now a gun collector’s dream. Thirty-three guns, twelve rocket launchers, a range finder, a central gun control house, machine guns, and a four-inch gun mounted on her fantail, the Q.M./G.G. was armored to the teeth. To protect her from submarines, from bow to stern she was girdled in a system of cables charged with electrical current that rendered her invisible to the sensors of underwater magnetic fields, assisted by an underwater sound detector system. To conceal her route, she got underway on a zig-zag course, less vulnerable to attack than earlier in the war. Although Allied ships traveled in convoys, they had been easy prey for Nazi wolf packs (German submarines that traveled together). In 1942 alone the Germans sank 1,664 Allied ships, and continued to dominate the Atlantic until early 1943. The Battle of the Atlantic that had raged simultaneously with the planning for the Allied counterattack on North Africa in November, 1942, had gained the Allies the upper-hand in the Atlantic by mid-1943.

Below deck, Q.M./G.G.’s transformation as a troop ship was a miraculous feat of engineering, but her Main Deck was reserved for Mr. Churchill and his entourage. His personal suite furnished to his taste and comfort, opened to a private dining area, conference room, and a map room, as well as a communications room that kept him in constant contact with both sides of the Atlantic. At the end of the voyage, Q.M./G.G. would deposit Mr. Churchill and his retinue at the landing jetty at Halifax, Nova Scotia, and there they would proceed to Quebec, Canada by train. Once arrived, they would take up residence at the Citadel, King George VI royal residence, an imposing structure that hovered on cliffs above the St. Lawrence River. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, President of the United States, was to join Mr. Churchill in Quebec for a confab on war policies. 

Mr. Churchill’s four days of occupancy within Q.M./G.G.’s walls prior to the conference were not set aside for leisure. His malodorous cigars chugged feverishly throughout his quarters the whole time. He even chomped on them while submerged in the bathtub of his private bathroom, bathing two times a day every day of the four days he was onboard her. Like a bloated, albino whale, he splashed around, gesticulating wildly, issuing orders to whomever perched beyond the bathroom door, waves of dirty water spilling over the side of the tub and puddling the tile floor.

His nasty habits that wreaked menace wherever he appeared notwithstanding, Mr. Churchill was an admirable and a likable fellow. He carried the weight of the war waged against his people and their considerable holdings around the globe on his shoulders, and still, he exhibited a ready and lively humor spiced with a charming eccentricity. His statuesque and elegant wife, Clementine was onboard with him, and most any onlooker would attest to the love they held for each other. Their long and admired romance expressed itself in a myriad of ways. His affection for the youngest of their five living offspring, their daughter, Mary, whom served as her father’s aide-de-camp on the voyage, was likewise palpable.

Oftener than not, it was Mary parked outside his bathroom door, a spiral stenographer pad in hand, pencil perched. “The impression I most want to convey to our friend the president…are you hearing me, Mary?”

“I hear you perfectly, Papa.”

“Take this down and do not miss a word. I will turn to your notes to keep me in touch with my own mind on these points, as you well know.”

“I am well aware, Papa, but you haven’t apprised me of any points to… ”

A great splash cut short Mary’s response as the prime minister slapped beneath the skin of the bathtub’s water. A wave jetted over the side and seeped beneath the cracks of the floor tiles. The great ship seemed to hold its breath as little florets of his air billowed up and danced along the surface, and then burst one by one, marking the seconds like a metronome. He popped back up, ran his hands across his eyes to clear them, and then honked like a goose to clear his sinuses. “I am pondering the points, daughter! Point A: the president must walk away from our conference reacquainted with Britain and her Dominion’s enormous contribution to our Anglo-American partnership, as well as our continued commitment to and involvement in it. We can’t have the American people develop an attitude that once we conquer Hitler, that we will fold up and walk away. We have much at stake in South-East Asia in the battle against Japan. I must be forthcoming with the president in shoring-up our position in that conflict. How does that sound, Mary?”

“Brilliant, Papa!”

“Point B: My water grows cold, daughter!” An impressive and talented assemblage of toes on his left foot crawled up the working end of the bathtub and turned the faucet. Hot water cascaded into the tub and he took a delicate sip of brandy that because of a lifting of the mandatory “dry-law” for his tenure aboard ship, hovered precariously in its glass on the rim of the tub. He then slipped the cigar between his lips, inhaled, and placed it in the ashtray on the flat surface behind his head as the smoke from it spurted from his nostrils. Presently the toes stole back up to the faucet and turned it off.

“Back to point B: I must dispel any notion on Franklin’s part that because of my desires for the South-East Asian Theater that I am not as committed to our cross-channel campaign into France next spring as is he. I must demonstrate to him that his Anglo partner is fully engaged in planning for Overlord. I also want to press on him that it is time to appoint the commander for the cross-channel operation.” Grunts and groans and splashing water accompanied his rise to his feet inside the tub. “Mary, I have misplaced my towel. Come! Come and help your Papa, my girl.”

Breakfasted, dressed and prepared an hour later, chugging cigar fixed in his lips, he joined the gathered Anglo and American Chiefs of Staff in the conference room. Thus began a working day comprised of hammering out the details of the goals for the approaching conference with the president. It was a routine that was repeated on each of his four days within Q.M/G.G.’s walls, workdays that extended well into the dinner hour.

A rumor abounds that the Queen Mary is haunted, but perhaps not in the way sponsored by certain persons who claim to know such things. Much more likely, the haunting stems from the startling reality of Mr. Churchill’s days onboard her, a time when he and a handful of other mere mortals pursued paths that would either safeguard the world against Hitler’s satanic power or allow it to flourish to the utter destruction of civilization, and/or of humanity.©

Note: the above essay is a work of fiction based on true events.



Image: RMS Queen Mary as the Grey Ghost



Recommended reading:

Memoirs of the Second World War by Winston S. Churchill  

HAUNTED QUEEN OF THE SEAS by Nicole Strickland

CLEMENTINE CHURCHILL, the Biography of a Marriage by Mary [Churchill] Soames

FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT and the Making of Modern America by Allan M. Winkler



Books by Linda Lee Greene are available for purchase in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com and by request at other booksellers.

 

         

 

CAULIFLOWER: The Bottom Line of a Super Food

Cauliflower provides some powerful health benefits.

Cauliflower is a great source of nutrients, including a few of which many people need more.

Cauliflower contains unique antioxidants that may reduce inflammation and protect against several diseases, such as cancer and heart disease.

Cauliflower is easy to add to your diet. It's tasty, easy to prepare, and can replace high-carb foods.

Cauliflower assists in weight loss.

To get the full lowdown on this fabulous vegetable, including some recipes, click onto the following link: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/benefits-of-cauliflower#section9.

Linda’s Cauliflower Soup:



In a crock pot, slow cooker, or soup pot, place florets of a head of cauliflower, 1 large, unpeeled tomato cut into wedges, 1 cup of frozen onion and 3 pepper mix (I keep bags of this mixture in my freezer—it eliminates the need to dice onions and peppers). Add ½ cup bacon bits, 1 packet of dry onion soup mix, ½ cup of water and ½ cup of almond milk. (If you dice fresh onion and peppers, add more liquid). Cook on high in crock pot or slow-cooker until the cauliflower is soft—on the stovetop, cook on medium-high heat until cauliflower is soft. For those able to eat chunky soup, your work is done other than eating and enjoying this flavor-rich, scrumptious soup. I go one step further because digesting whole cauliflower can be a problem for me. I pulse it in my blender until it is creamy and thick. YUM! – Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist

NOW AND THEN WE HAVE TO SHOOT THE MULES

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.



As was his routine, Commanding Officer, Lieutenant General George Smith Patton, Jr. reviewed the troops the night before the July 21 – 23, 1943 offensive into Palermo, Sicily. He stopped right in front of me where I stood in formation and asked me my name and home state.

“Martin Gavin from Ohio, Sir,” I answered.

He looked me over good with those penetrating eyes of his and asked, “Is your mother there in Ohio, Private Gavin?”

“Yes, Sir!” I replied.

“Well, give her my regards in your next letter home. And tell her you’re working for the best damn ass-kicker in this man’s army.”

“Yes, Sir!” I repeated. The jury was still out in my mind as to whether or not I held him in such high esteem. He was all flash and ego, and I couldn’t help wondering if he was in it to bring glory on himself rather than victory over a heinous enemy of his country. An incident a day later decided it for me.

I think he picked me out of the line because the two of us stood eye to eye, and from a distance, we resembled each other. Like Patton, I was tall and my hair and eyebrows and eyelashes had bleached white from the relentless sun in that part of the world. I suspect he also detected by the overoptimistic thrust of my chin the remnants of my stubborn naïveté about the realities of war. I still believed in my bones that the poor SOB next to me might get killed, but not me! I would see absolutely in the next three days up close and personal that war kills—maybe even me, and not just men.

Our charge from the bottom to the top of Sicily took us over its challenging natural terrain in a 200 miles thrust. We broke through the enemy’s immediate front and rolled him back, accomplished by our forward Infantry and supporting tanks. In the mountains southwest of Palermo, the enemy engaged us again, but we drove him back with artillery fire and tanks. The Germans had dug treacherous pits along the sides of the roads concealed by chicken wire and dirt. At the place of each pit, they had strung wire entanglements across the roads in the hope our tanks would drive around them and crash into the roadside pits. But we were on to the enemy’s tricks. We stuck to the road and blasted through the wire entanglements.

All of a sudden, our long column of vehicles and equipment came to an abrupt halt as we approached a bridge that was our only access across a mean river. “WHAT THE F%#%!” the roar of hundreds of men went out. Our commander’s was the loudest of them all. From behind the steering wheel of my half-track in my position near the front of the column, I saw that a cart driven by an old Sicilian man and towed by two mules was parked square in the middle of the narrow bridge. The mules were lowered to their arses, unmoving. Patton jumped down from his Jeep at the front of the column as simultaneously the old Sicilian climbed down from his cart. They met at the heads of the stubborn mules. “GET THESE G#%&$#% MULES OFF THIS BRIDGE!” Patton bawled, his buttermilk face purple with rage, his burly left arm thrusting in the air, and the walking stick in his hand tracing threatening circles at the Sicilian.

 

The Sicilian babbled in Italian and waved his arms wildly, his head swinging back and forth on his shoulders. He grabbed the hackamore of the mule closest to him and pulled with all his strength. He pushed; he pulled; he begged. The mules would not move. In a flash, just like the Cisco Kid, Patton pulled his Colt .45 from his right-hip holster, took aim and shot one mule and then the other dead-center of their foreheads. The mules plopped over on their sides, dead as doornails. Tears sprang to the old Sicilian’s eyes and he bawled like a baby, his shoulders pumping up and down pathetically. Patton put his revolver back in its holster and ordered a cadre of his men to roll the carcasses over the side of the bridge to the deep of the water below. And he wasn’t finished. To stop the old man’s protestations, Patton struck him on his body with his walking stick. The man cowered and turned back to his cart where it was pushed to the side of the road, out of our way.

The knuckles of my hands were white from gripping the steering wheel of the half-track. Strong emotions swept over me like a pounding tide—first shock, and then anger, anger over the loss the poor old Sicilian incurred. “How would he ever replace his mules, his major source of livelihood and transport?” I asked myself. But in only a few seconds I understood what had really happened. This was the very reason George S. Patton was our leader. The mules and their powerless owner at that moment were the enemy. They set up a life and death situation, because the barrier they created not only blocked our advance but made of us sitting ducks for the enemy that was around us everywhere.

It was a big lesson in life I learned that day. A decision had to be made. There was no time to hem and haw over it. Shooting the obstinate mules and sweeping them out of our way was the expedient recourse, and the war, all wars, if nothing else are slave to expediency. It was an act on Patton’s part that added to the controversy that dogged him, but he won my mind that day, if not my heart. My heart—well, it just didn’t want to come along. It wanted to stay down there, cuddled in its soft, sweet greenness. That’s why I was a lowly private and prayed to stay that way.

The hair on the back of my head stood up under my helmet and I hunched low over the steering wheel of my half-track. I wanted to abandon my vehicle and take cover in the nearby bushes. The half-track saved my legs and feet, but put me too high in the enemy’s line of fire. I didn’t want to think or feel anymore. I wanted to get moving again. I wanted to go home.

It was nearing dark as we approached Palermo on day three of our advance. Patton received word that the city had fallen to our forward troops, and he elected to go in. The hills on each side of the long road we traveled were burning. We entered the town and the street was lined thick on both sides with people who shouted, “Down with Mussolini! Long live America!” The flowers and lemons and watermelons tossed at the forward troops in symbols of welcome, littered the street. The governor had skipped town, but we went on to capture two generals, both of whom were added to the close to ten thousand prisoners who were bagged during the course of our march. The scuttlebutt was that when Patton inspected the harbor the following morning, a group of prisoners held in the POW compound there stood up, saluted, and then cheered him.©

Image: Patton in his Jeep conferring with U.S. Army Lt. Col. Lyle Bernard, CO, 30^th Infantry Regiment, a prominent figure in the second daring amphibious landing behind enemy lines on Sicily’s north coast – July 23, 1943.

Note: the above essay is a work of historical fiction based on actual events.

Recommended reading: “War as I Knew It” by Gen. George S. Patton, Jr. and “Max Corvo, OSS Italy, 1942 – 1945” by Max Corvo.

Books by Linda Lee Greene are available for purchase in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com.

A WRITER’S TERROR

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.

I am reminded today by way of “Your Facebook Memories,” of a piece I posted five years ago, dated: September 12, 2014. It describes the terror I felt at the time, and still feel, at putting my words on the page and disclosing myself to a reading public.

Correction: It isn’t that I fear the process of writing and its reception. I am blessed that my work is usually well received. My terror arises from the hoops through which we writers must jump to reach a reading public, and the disappointment that comes when our efforts yield less than we had hoped. The emotion that overpowers me most strongly during those dry periods of silence from readers is despondency, and my despondency leads to avoidance of its pain, which results in evasion of the demanding process of putting myself out there again. I am not a very brave person. I avoid pain! And I recognize full well that my avoidance of pain corresponds directly to the scope of my living.

That’s all for today and as I stated five years ago…”To be continued”…Below is my Facebook Post, dated September 12, 2014:

September 12, 2014—I sit uneasily before the blank white window of my laptop, my unproductive fingers jerking like dying pulses above the keyboard, my silent throat beating like an uncaged bird against my exposed skin, my wild heart snaking unimpeded in a poisonous orgy to the bottom of my stomach. This unstroked rectangle might as well be the longest, widest, cruelest stretch of the Sahara Desert, and I, a lone, fluid-starved initiate who must cross it, but know not how to get to the nearest source of water.

How long has it been since I’ve credited myself as Linda Lee Greene, writer of two long-neglected blogs, the bestselling author of two books, and of three manuscripts chomping at the bit to see the light of day—to have their words printed on pages other people can read? How long—sixteen months, eighteen months, twenty? Am I spent—fizzled out? Was I just a brief burst of brightness in a friendly sky—or is my spirit still orbiting there—silently—intrepidly digging—no, maybe drawing off by now, a fountain, a geyser, or just a shy trickle of water yet to reach me? Even a droplet would fill me now.

The soles of my feet are burning from standing still. “But the sands of that blanched desert will be hotter!” I remind myself. Do I stay here within the fringe of this Devil’s disguise, a geography that’s choking me, hardening me into a pillar of salt? Or are my feet calloused enough from my grueling, silent traverse through this deadly drought to withstand the heat of that hotter place? Will I plant my right foot across that awful divide? Will my footprint rearrange the molecules of that gasping landscape lying ahead? I don’t know. All I can really hope for today is, “To be continued....”©

Books by Linda Lee Greene are available for purchase in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com and other booksellers.

BEATING A SLOW METABOLISM

To date, I’ve lost 18 pounds in my three-month quest to peel down to my former best weight. I’m losing at a snail’s pace, but that is because I'm hampered by issues with my health and work requirements that make it difficult for me to exercise in ways helpful to weight loss.

            My success is directly related to my eliminating bad carbohydrates found in grains from my diet: no white, wheat, Italian, French breads, or buns, or any baked goods, or cereals, or any of such things sold in our grocery stores. I also don’t consume oats and farina and cream of wheat. Instead, I bake delicious breads, muffins, crackers, pancakes, pizza, and more, and make creamy cereals with almond meal (and almond milk), which are rich in protein rather than in carbohydrates found in the aforementioned foodstuffs. I bake desserts with coconut flour, which is also rich in protein. I could live on bread and things made from grains; that is why I had to find substitutes to stick to any healthy meal plan. I still eat pasta and rice, but only rarely because they are laced with carbohydrates. Spaghetti squash is a great way to replace pasta, and cauliflower cooked down to rice-size is a nice substitute for rice.

            Processed foods are also a no-no. None of that packaged stuff! I was shocked to learn that apples, peaches, oranges, grapes and others, all of which have been regular items in my diet for my entire adult life, are high in carbs. I’ve replaced them with strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries. Those berries are rich in ingredients beneficial to human health, and are very low in carbs. Potatoes and all potato products are also long gone for me. Healthier are sweet potatoes and yams, but only in moderation. Tomatoes, which are medium-high in carbs, still show up now and then on my plate. Vegetables are part of my daily meal plans, other than corn, peas, and some others pretty high in carbs. I regard corn syrup and gluten as veritable poisons. I read food labels obsessively because corn syrup and gluten are in so many products. I keep Google busy tracking down such culprits.

            If you are a coffee-drinker like me, I recommend that you don’t use powdered coffee creamer if you want to slim down. It is made from grains (carbs). I’ve replaced it with half and half, or cream, or unsweetened and unflavored almond milk creamer. I also eat lots of cheese, olive oil, and Olivio spread, which is made from olive oil and is a fabulous substitute for margarine or butter, although butter is okay, as are most fats in this diet. I have learned that carbs are the culprit rather than fats for me and lots of other people. Fats haven’t increased my cholesterol level. My cholesterol has actually gone down with this diet: 50 points in three months.

            I know that soda pop and packaged juices, which are full of sugar, will keep the inches on my body, and destroy my health. Sugar is evil, evil, evil! Research studies have shown that sugar is a cancer-causer and a cancer-booster. Cancer cells live off sugar molecules. That means that cancer cells stay alive in large part because their host (victims and potential victims of cancer) are consuming sugar and sugar products. I don’t eat candy of any kind. I’ve replaced sugar with Stevia, which is a natural product made from the stevia plant. It has a mild flavor that doesn’t leave that awful aftertaste like artificial sugar substitutes do. I use honey in moderation. Frozen Yogurt ice cream rather cow’s milk ice cream is my choice when I can find it, or I make a dessert with Yogurt, cream, an egg (optional), stevia or honey, vanilla extract, and berries whipped up and frozen. I am a meat- and fish-eater, so I enjoy, enjoy, enjoy! Another key is drinking lots of water, which not only boosts better health but also helps me (and most everyone) to lose weight faster. I definitely need to increase my water consumption! Often when we feel hungry, we are actually thirsty. So I recommend reaching for a glass of water rather than those crackers, or potato chips, or God help us, a candy bar.

An easy formula is to eat whole, real, fresh, and colorful food—50% to 75% vegetables, and to consume protein at every meal. Because I have a thyroid condition, I avoid soy products. Otherwise, I’ve read that they are okay.           

Image: Cauliflower Risotto



Recipe: Grate a head of cauliflower using food processor. Place in a pot, cover with water, and bring to boil, cook 3 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Heat 3 tablespoons of butter or Olivio in a large pan, add 1 medium chopped onion, 2 minced garlic cloves, and a cup of vegetables. (Green beans are shown in this image, but I would use canned carrots or olives or canned diced tomatoes or capers.) Cook for 6 to 8 minutes. Add ½ cup water, ¼ cup tomato paste, and spices of your preference, and a pinch of salt. Curry powder, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, and honey are popular ingredients with this recipe to give it additional kick. I avoid those spices because of my digestive issues. Turn heat to low and add cauliflower and mix thoroughly. This is a swell side dish with meat or salad rather than rice or potatoes.



PS Cauliflower already grated, nicely packaged, and ready to use is available in major grocery stores. – Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist©    

©IN THE SHADOW OF DEATH

 By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.



At the precise hour that Beatrice prepared for bed at their home in the United States, George perched on a rock that was tucked among an outcropping of ancient boulders high above the coastline of some godforsaken, derelict area of Mussolini’s Sicily. If there was ever a lost civilization or the Dark Ages revisited, this was it. It was understandable why it was Italy's Achilles Heel.

It was the time of day when everyday if circumstances allowed it that he stopped to conjure his wife in his mind’s eye, the twilight hour—just before dark, when figures stood out starkly against their landscape for one last curtain call—just before they smoldered and vanished, sucked into their distinct placements on the planet. It was no easy task being the wife of a dedicated military man—it was a lonely and difficult and thankless life sentence for her, and he knew it. He pulled his helmet from his head, held it in his lap, and ran his hands across his damp pate. July in Sicily in that year of our Lord of 1943 was an anteroom of Hades, and U.S. Army Lieutenant General George Smith Patton, Jr. hated everything about it: the squalid, filthy peasants; the ruined towns; the tight hairpin roads; the impassible mountains; the dust; the bugs.

His pistols in their holsters were heavy and hot against his hips. He yearned for the end of the day when he would unbuckle the belt and lay the guns on the little table next to his bed in the schoolhouse he had procured for his Seventh Army headquarters. He slipped the Colt .45 revolver out of its holster on his right hip. Its ivory grip was smooth in his palm, but its silver plating was in need of buffing. The .357 Magnum on his left hip could also use some attention. He knew his fellow officers ridiculed his flashy, swashbuckling image. But he didn’t care what they thought about it. He believed it inspired his troops. And besides, he liked standing out from the crowd.  

Placing the revolver back in its holster, George sank back on his elbows. It was reliably quiet at this hour. Even the enemy needed this daily respite from the fighting, this time to gobble down their rations, to drop their grungy trousers and take a leak or crap, to spread the cheeks of their crusty a-holes to the air. He allowed himself only a moment of reprieve and then sat back up, his spine straight and taut as a statue, his senses alert for enemy movement. He studied the beach far below. It was jam-packed with hundreds of Allied ships that from his distant perch looked like the collection of his boyhood toys. The armada stretched in both directions as far as the eye could see. It brought to his mind the many years of battles between the Roman and the Carthaginian fleets, and the decisive conquest that finally gave Rome control of the Mediterranean, one or two centuries before the birth of Christ. In a former life, he very well might have been a Roman sailor on one of those ships, or more likely, a commander.

The thing he missed most about his home was his library, its shelves stuffed full of his books, most of them on military history. What would Julius Caesar or Napoleon do now if they were in George’s boots? The difference was that they were supreme commanders. Their hands were not tied by superiors less experienced, and yes, less capable than themselves. On the other hand, George had a clear-cut advantage those commanders in earlier times lacked. He had a mobile, mechanized army, a fast-moving armored tank and half-track army that laid waste of anything in its path. George knew that if fate favored him, he would earn the reputation as the World War II military commander the Nazis most feared. But he was also the “bad boy” of his Supreme Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower’s crew, and because of that dichotomy, he was often a breath away from glory or from dishonor. He hoped his legacy would be honor. He hoped his would be an honorable death. He also knew that death stalked him like a bloodhound.

“It is rather interesting how you get used to death. I have had to go to inspect the troops in which case you run a very good chance—or I should say a reasonable chance—of being bombed or shot at from the air, and shelled or shot at from the ground. I had the same experience every day in which for the first half-hour the palms of my hands sweat and I feel depressed. Then, if one hits near you, it seems to break the spell and you don't notice them anymore. Going back in the evening over the same ground and at a time when the shelling and bombing are usually heavier, you become so used to it you never think about it,”[1] George stated in a letter to a friend written during the course of the war.

George pulled to his feet and headed back to headquarters, only a few paces away. The shelling was about to begin anew on this oppressive summer evening of 1943, somewhere in half-dead Sicily. This is a good place for vampires, he thought to himself as he stomped his thigh-high boots on the hard-packed ground to shed them of their stubborn layer of dust. 

Note: The above essay is a work of fiction based on well-known characterizations of Patton. The setting in which Greene places him depicts the area in which he first landed in Sicily during Operation Husky, but his interlude at the rock and all that transpired there are products of her imagination. The excerpt from the letter Patton wrote to a friend on the theme of death is authentic. It was Greene’s inspiration for her essay.



Image: Lieutenant General George Smith Patton, Jr. – North, Africa, 1942/43



Books by Linda Lee Greene are available for purchase in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com and other booksellers.

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[1]Letter to Frederick Ayers (5 May 1943), published in The Patton Papers 1940-1945 (1996) edited by Martin Blumenson, p. 243

©WHAT ARE OUR REAL LAST NAMES?

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.



I suppose that because I am an artist, I am hard-pressed to designate one color among the whole spectrum of colors that is my favorite. I appreciate each and every one of them for their unique contribution to our beautiful world. On the other hand, if someone put a gun to my head and told me to choose only one, I guess it would have to be the color of green.

                I also have a special connection to the color of green because of my surname, which, until my paternal grandfather stuck an extra “e” onto the end of it for reasons unknown, was actually “Green.” Ancestry.com indicates that the largest percentage of my DNA hails from Gaelic sources. We have traced our original paternal ancestor in America to one Stephen Green, who disembarked from Liverpool, England on his trek to the new world. This was sometime in the 1700s.

                My Facebook friend and fellow author and artist, Pamela Allegretto-Franz posted an interesting bit of trivia today that got me to thinking about my last name. She tells us that when entering ports of entry to America, that immigrant last names were/are sometimes altered or replaced completely. (Recall the famous scene in the “Godfather.”) For instance, her ancestor’s surname was actually Allegretti, changed to Allegretto at Ellis Island. She also indicated that if a person’s name was perhaps, “Bianco,” it might be changed to the English definition of the word, which is “White.”

                Well, I immediately asked Google to find for me the Gaelic word for “green.” Three possibilities came up: glas; uaine (oo-ie-ya); and gorm. Actually, gorm is oftener associated with “blue.” Might my ancestor’s real name have been Stephen Glas, or Stephen Uaine, or Stephen Gorm? I will put my bloodhound sister, Sherri on that case.

                My greenest green painting is titled, “Guardians and Other Angels,” after the title of my novel. Signed prints of my artwork are available for purchase by contacting me on Facebook’s Instant Messenger or at llgreene13@yahoo.com. My books can be purchased in eBook and soft cover at Amazon.com.