Stalingrad, Russia October 21,1943
"More, Grandpa, more!"
The old man caught his breath. His wrists were thick with muscle built from welding armor plates onto tank turrets all day, six days a week. His shoulders were strong from a lifetime of hard labor. He smiled at his granddaughter and wrapped his sausage thick fingers around her gossamer thin forearms. He picked her up and began to spin until the sky became solid gray with flecks of blue and white swirled around. He swung her until every last breath of air in her small, war damaged lungs erupted as giggles and laughter. He swung until his back crack and his shoulders realigned. He spun for a moment of joy.
His daughter chuckled. It was a source of joy that playing with his granddaughters could occasionally make her laugh again. Her husband had gone to the front in the summer of 1942 and somewhere, his unit was destroyed and his body had been left to decay into the thick sod of the steppes. Since then, she worked, she raised her children and then she worked again without much joy beyond seeing her father play with her children like he had never been able to play with her.
The old man sat on the ground as the young girl tried to catch her feet. She failed. She fell into him. They both smiled.
"Again grandpa, again!"
They spun again.