As soon as I could after the war, I returned to work for the AT&T Corporation in St. Louis. It may not have been the wisest move I ever made but Congress had passed a law that provided that those of us who had worked in industry prior to military service should be reinstated.
AT&T rented quarters from the Southwestern Bell Telephone Company in the headquarters building at 1010 Pine Street in St. Louis. Across the street was a small delicatessen operated by three Greek fellows. The father was a man in his late fifties or sixties who had completed the immigration requirements. Two of his sons worked the counter of the deli. Because it was so close to the telephone company, it did not lack for business. My recollection is that this delicatessen did not serve dinners. It started early in the morning, and somewhere around 4:30 or 5:00 o’clock they were done for the day.
The sons who worked the counter of the deli were engaging men. They were both about my age, which would have been 23, 24, or 25 years. Both of them had served in the United States armed forces during the Second World War.
The elder son was a husky fellow who did not waste much time with customers if they did not know what they wanted. After a short time, he and I became good friends. An incident took place between the elder son and myself in the early months of 1946. At that point, the Second World War was very much on everyone’s mind. Certainly it was on the minds of myself and the man who worked the counter at the deli.
There came a time when during a lull in the business at the counter the elder son turned to me and asked a personal question. He knew of course that I was away during the war years. He looked directly at me and said, “You were in the Army.” I told him that I had so served. He then asked me, “Did you ever get kissed?” I knew exactly what he meant. He was asking whether I had ever been shot during my service in the Army. I told the older son who worked at the counter that as a matter of fact I did indeed get kissed. I explained to him that it was not a bullet that got me kissed but an anti-aircraft gun spraying white hot flak during the bombing raid on Ancona on December 8, 1943.
Flak is an acronym. I do not know what the initials F L A K stand for anymore. After all, this was about 70 years ago. When the German gunners shot at us flying overhead, the shells would explode and flak would go in every direction. I suppose the German gunners on the ground hoped that the flak from their shells would kill or injure us. Secondarily, they hoped that the flak from the bursting shells would cripple an engine.
Flak was a continuing worry for all of us. When a shell exploded, small segments heated white-hot would penetrate the surrounding air. I was “kissed” by one of these elements of flak. When I answered the question about being kissed, the man who worked at the deli counter told me that he had been shot in the foot or leg. So here we were, young men less than 25 years of age, discussing how we had been kissed.
But it seems that even after the passage of 65 or more years, I was glad to be able to answer the fellow who worked the deli counter, letting him know that I understood what getting kissed really was. From that date forward, he and I enjoyed a close relationship. I suspect that if he has survived he would be, like me, in his nineties. I would not be surprised if for the bulk of his life he was running a restaurant or a deli somewhere. But wherever he is, I hope that he is alive and, more than anything else, I wish him well. He was a hard-working fellow as were his father and his brother. When you ordered a cup of coffee, at least for me he would keep the cup filled until I showed signs of leaving.
That is my story at this very late date about getting “kissed” and about the existence of flak. I suppose that flak would kill as many soldiers as bullets. Obviously I don’t have an account of that relationship. But they shot at us and we shot at them in the nature of war. Those days are gone now and I wish that they would never ever return. If you are ever asked about getting kissed or about flak, you now have the necessary ingredients to formulate a comprehensive answer. As for me, I am pleased with the fact that “getting kissed” is no longer a concern of mine and that is the way I like it.
E. E. CARR
October 20, 2012
Essay 707
Postscript: Flak is an acronym for the German word Fliegerabwehrkanone. Even Hitler himself would have trouble spitting this word out.
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Kevin’s commentary: One of Pop’s recent favorites, and for good reason. You can check out a quick video on Flak weapons in Europe here. Having watched it I think of the phrase “getting flak” for something and immediately hope that I never get to experience this in a literal way. Simultaneously I can say that I’ve never been kissed and I’m rather happy about that.