There are those who say a picture is worth a thousand words. I will
agree what better way to save memories than a simple photo snapped more than four decades ago. This photo seems odd and out of place in America but in Japan it is the kind that are a dime a dozen, maybe a little less or a little more, but this was taken when it took 360 yen to make a greenback dollar. This place was near one of many old canals, near buildings that were still standing, mere shells of what they had been before the war, but nobody was mad, never can I remember one ill word about the fires that razed the old port city made of wood. It was a place where veterans of a surrendered nation met and talked, not in whispers or hushed folds, but loud enough to hear if one could understand. It was a strange time, a healing time, a time to celebrate a peace forged in atomic ashes, cinders and smiles.