War, Music, and Me

For most of my life, war has been something that we learned in our history books at school. However, war has touched my family and changed the course of our lifes in the process. My father, Robert R. Kotnik was a gunner in the Army during World War II. At age 17, he saw things that I could never imagine. On one fateful night, his flight crew was called for another routine mission. However, this time, he was selected to ride with a different crew due to an unforseen illness of one of their crew members. As fate would have it, his original crew went down in a storm and all on board were lost.

My father never forgot that night as well and always taught us about the history of World War II and the music that kept him going through the toughest of times. I loved watching him play Boogie Woogie music on his piano as he taught his children to appreciate a variety of music and an appreciation for history itself. I have a love of big band music and Bob Hope USO shows. In fact, in elementary school I engaged two friends to join me as the Andrew Sisters and lip-sync a routine to Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B!

I often think about the twist of fate that allowed that soldier to survive the war, meet and marry a pretty young girl from Tiffin, Ohio and eventually have a family of seven children. Why was my father spared that night? How close I came to never existing. It just proves that life is full of twists of fate and unimaginable timelines poised on the tip of coincidence or destiny. In any case, I never forget the lives that were taken, and those that were spared that one fateful night. In fact, my love of music from that era reminds me of this event each and every time.

Do you have a story to tell about a veteran or an experience with war or conflict. Please send me your post or comments.

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