Ironical, but so True

Surviving an immense war like World War II to later be killed by one of your fellow soldiers?... Does that even sound right!? I’d expect the soldiers to be more united than anything, to be like brothers, very supportive , because at the end they are crossing through the same situation, a hard one, and thus, they should be there for each other. Instead, they are wishing the other would survive so when the war is over they could send someone to kill him. What kind of person in the right mind would wish this!

Certainly, Lazzaro is not in the right mind. He keeps on threatening other soldiers about getting them killed when the war is over. He threatens them but doesn’t even have the pants to kill them himself, instead he will send someone else to do the dirty work for him. Please! He makes everyone believe he is so tough and mean but he isn’t able to do his own dirty work.

The sad part however, is that Lazzaro promises Billy that if he gets out of war a live, he will get him killed… and he does fulfill that promise. About 30 years later…

I finally understood what Billy meant when he said that the most important thing he learned from the Trafalmadorians was that a person only appears to be dead because actually, he is still alive in the past. What he means is that there is always a past, present and future, so when someone dies he is still living in the past. It’s hard to explain, maybe it will be easier if you read this: “In the next moment Billy Pilgrim is dead. So it goes. So Billy experiences death for a while (…) Then he swings back into his life again, all the way back to an hour after his life was threatened by Lazzaro- in 1945.” (Pg. 143) People never really die, they will always be alive in a different time period.

Just like in The Time Travelers Wife. Like I mentioned on an earlier blog entry, Henry, the husband, sees his death a few times, and when he dies (in that time period) his wife and daughter cry, but  then, he goes to the past and lives happily with them. He is never dead. Just like Billy explains…