What do you do when Clifford doesn’t come home?

They had a big family. They knew what the country was going through. They all volunteered to help. And when it was over, they all came back home, except Clifford.

I don’t remember the family talking about him. I did find some letters from my mother to her mother trying to give support from across the country. I’m sure at the time it was difficult but like every other family of the time, there was a lot of support. It was a big family and they were there for my grandmother, except for Clifford.

There was a picture in my grandmother’s living room. It was my mother’s brother. He was in his white uniform. A brown metal hung on the picture. No one talked about the picture. No one went into the living room, except for Clifford.

He had a wife. Don’t know if the family ever had any contact with her. Maybe she remarried. Maybe she didn’t. No one seems to know, except for Clifford.

The military records say he was a lieutenant pilot in the navy born in 1922. The military awarded him the Navy flying cross so he must have been a good pilot. The military said he took off from an aircraft carrier. All my uncles and aunts and their spouses came home from the war, except for Clifford.

Photos show him was a smiling handsome man. No one knows what happened to him. Maybe he ran out of gas? Maybe he was shot down? No one knows, except Clifford.

I was given his name.