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Every Memorial Day I am reminded of my Uncle Joe, my mother’s oldest brother. He’s been dead for more than a decade now but whenever I think of the sacrifices our soldiers make and how most are changed forever–even the ones lucky enough to make it home–I think of my Uncle Joe. He talked often about his experiences as a medic in World War II, and as a young girl, I learned that war changes people in ways that are irretrievable, that stay with them into old age. (This Sunday’s Boston Globe has an essay by George Masters that addresses this poignantly.) For now, I want to share one particular moment from my uncle’s war. An immigrant, who came to this country when he was eight years old, Uncle Joe had struggled with belonging in Boston, often running away from my grandmother, his stepfather, and his siblings in the North End, trying to find his way back home to the beaches of Sicily where he was born. My grandmother would find him at the docks, drag him home, and make him go to school yet again, to learn English, to get an education. It wasn’t until the war when he was a young soldier marching the streets of London, and the Brits, who were so grateful for our presence, would shout to him “Hey Yank! Nice to see ya Yank!” that he felt like an American for the first time in his life.