"Her nightmares woke us nearly every night, leaving her hoarse. She had inexplicable outbursts of anger during the day. A battered Army footlocker in the living room held her mementos, but my mother carried World War II inside her like a ghost. She had never been a soldier, but she volunteered to serve with the Red Cross Clubmobile Service and followed the troops into combat.
The Clubmobile Service was essentially a mobile social club for the battlefront. The 'Donut Dollies' drove two-and-a-half-ton GMC trucks, three women to a crew. In the back of the truck: a galley with huge electric urns for making coffee and a doughnut machine, a record player, sometimes letters from loved ones to be delivered. My mother was trained to always be a friendly face, ready to listen, comfort and encourage. Which meant she and the other women were also direct and secondhand witnesses to everything that happened during that brutal war. I now recognize my mother was tortured by PTSD, her nightmares and outbursts classic symptoms of something she would never understand: After all, 'battle fatigue' was for the boys."
~ Luis Alberto Urrea
"Opinion | My Mother Returned From World War II a Changed Woman"
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/12/opinion/women-ww2-redcross-clubmobile.html
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"The meat of the film is Miller’s foray into the theater of war in Europe, i.e., the actual war, where young people, mostly men, were being mutilated and killed in action. Miller is refused military accreditation (which she overcomes after much persistence) and often hears phrases like, 'You can’t be here, lady.' This might seem terribly sexist now, but when Miller encounters a military hospital, with all its attendant horrors, she begins to wonder if they have a point."
~ Damon Wise
"'Lee’ Review: Kate Winslet In A Complex Biopic..."
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