We had all the kids this past weekend and whenever we do, we always invite Paul’s dad, Pop Pop,  for Sunday dinner. I usually make a roast pork loin,  lasagna or some big feast-like family dinner. No buffet or eating in front of the TV. Everyone has to sit at the table. No one can eat until everyone is served and no one can be excused until everyone is finished eating. Afterward we sit and talk. Since we so enjoyed Pop Pop’s friend Lotus when she came for Thanksgiving, we asked him to bring her again. As I mentioned before, Lotus has had a rich and full life. She was once an actress in New York City and Hollywood and was married to Robert Altman, (director of M.A.S.H and Gosford Park) before he was famous. This past Sunday we learned more about her.

After dinner Sophia was sitting with us and had her American History book on the dining room table. Lotus asked her what she was studying and she replied, “Fat Man and Little Boy.” (These were the code names for the first atomic weapons developed during WWII.) “Oh,” she replied, “I dated the physicist who came up with the idea  to have the bombs implode rather than explode. He took me for a tour of his lab and he showed me some of the technology they were working on. Not the top secret stuff, but what he could show me.”  She went on to explain that he left on a secret mission and she never heard from him again. She told us his name, which we later Googled, but nothing turned up. Sophia was astonished. “You knew someone who worked on the Manhattan Project?” she asked in amazement. Lotus and Pop Pop, who is a veteran of both WWII and The Korean War, then went on to talk about the horrors of war. They gave Sophia their first hand experience of what they had lived through. It was a great opportunity for Sophia to learn “history” from those who experienced it when it was current events.