Good to hear from you, Tony. What extraordinary coincidences you share with your neighbour! You wouldn't believe it unless you experienced it, would you? I did meet a couple in a shop in Ararat (Victoria) and said, on hearing their accent, "I bet I know where you come from," meaning London, of course. It turned out they were from Shortlands and knew Downham well, especially the Downham Baths. However, they didn't seem at all interested in having more than a desultory conversation. I also met a man who was from Grove Park but he, too, wasn't interesting in reminiscing with me.
I was born in 1943. My father, being 30ish, was called up in the second wave (he'd been a regular soldier from many years previously) and I should know what year it was but don't. I don't know how often he might have come home on leave but according to my mother, he came home from France on leave and just avoided the Dunkirk debacle. My uncle was captured there and spent the rest of the war as a POW. So many tales to tell but nobody really spoke much about it and I was too young to have all the questions I now do.
Did you and your father manage to develop a good relationship eventually despite being virtual strangers to each other? I had a friend who came home to a new daughter but could never really 'take' to her somehow. Rather sad and I think it was not an isolated case.
You are correct, in my opinion, about all the suicides and depression that go on now. But I think the challenges in modern day life are different to those of our generation and certainly of the generation that got through the war and simply had to get going. I think, also, that many marriages that might have otherwise succeeded, failed because of the war and separations. If my own parents were happy when they first married, they certainly weren't after the war.
Bren