He told me once that the army doctor’s orders were plain: he must push everything he’d seen, everything he’d done, from his mind.
Just don’t ever ask, Meggie. They said it’s best if ye just never ask and things don’t ever get said.
It made sense to him. He had no wish to bring unsayable things from the dark to live with us in the weatherboard cottage in Martha Street. But they did, anyway. Of course they did. I had learned for myself that things like that had to live somewhere.
—Meggie Tulloch, Elemental
Lest we forget the sacrifice of lives in all wars—on the battlefields, and long after…
looking up/looking down 
Oh, Amanda, this excerpt from Elemental is such a poignant, heart-aching reminder of the disservice we and our countries did to our soldiers, well intentioned as it was, to ‘help’ returned servicemen and women overcome the trauma of war. Such tender lives decimated before they had barely begun. Thanks for posting this reminder. xx
Thank you, Robyn. I remember reading about these instructions to returning soldiers, the ‘lucky ones’ who came back, after the Great War. Well intentioned, as you say, but what damage they caused to those silent men and their uncomprehending families…