September, 1939.
Poland was, to say in the very least, angry with Britain and France. Although the support of his people - much related to that of young Confederate soldiers destined to surrender in 1861 - would have been enough to push back Hitler's Reich at the earliest stages of invasion beyond the borders, he simply /couldn't ignore the other problem at hand./
The young men, he observed, were exuberant in their speech. While in Warsaw for private business, he watched at citizens crowded cafes and the twenty-five theatres that inhabited the cities - the baroque beauties that made it a self-proclaimed "Paris of eastern Europe" - chatter excitedly about the war. They were excited to fight?
Their language intrigued him. Although Polish was like his home, his entire existence - he loved his language - these men were different. Their accents, their mix of Russian and Polish, some Lithuanian, the mix of voices hurt his head and made him dizzy. These soldiers were young. These soldiers didn't know war. These soldiers were inexperienced, these soldiers were just little boys who still used /Gone with the Wind/ as a bedtime stories. These men, these boys, were barely eighteen. They were barely men. Poland couldn't take it. He spent the rest of the afternoon sick at home, Lithuania crouching by his side has he held his face over a putrid bucket, crying into his own vomit. He missed his meetings.