Shell Shock

Watercolor on Paper - 2017

That's how they used to refer to PTSD. Shell Shock. I was going through some old family photos the other day and I came across a strange one from World War Two.

Young men standing around smoking cigarettes on the porch of a military hospital. Three in uniform and one wearing fancy pajamas. I was struck by their resemblance to a punk band from the late Seventies or early Eighties. I showed the photo to others and everyone agreed with me that they might as well have been Wall of Voodoo or Joy Division.

The original photo is in black and white.