Once upon a time, in the late 1950s, a child asked her father a question that children all over the world were asking theirs: 

"What did you do in the war, Daddy?" 

     That night, the father tucked his daughter under the covers among an assortment of dolls, stuffed animals, and Little Golden Books. 

And, in a whisper, told his war story for the first and final time:

     Well...they put me on a ship that carried me halfway around the world and dropped me off, all alone, on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean. 

Along came a great whale to swallow the island whole, with me on it. There I was, inside the belly of the whale, where it's dark and you don't know 

when or if you'll ever get out alive. After what seemed forever, the whale spit me out...and the ship came to pick me up and take me home. The end.

     With that, the storyteller gathered up the pile of Little Golden Books, returned them to their place on the shelf, whispered good night, 

and turned out the light. 

     He never talked about it, his war, again.