Information

Smoochey
Legacy Name: Smoochey

The

Nostalgic Ontra
Owner: Yorick

Age: 10 years, 9 months, 3 weeks

Born: May 22nd, 2015

Adopted: 11 months, 2 weeks, 2 days ago

Adopted: April 2nd, 2025

Statistics

Level: 105
Strength: 204
Defense: 101
Speed: 171
Health: 100
HP: 100/100
Intelligence: 202
Books Read: 184
Food Eaten: 215
Job: Captain Jacques First Mate

CREDITS

profile template (c) helix (get it)
story by: Yorick

1. photo by: Alfred Eisenstaedt
Life 1945
2. photo by: Joe Rosenthal
Associated Press 1945

August 1945 - V-J Day WWII

The photo of a kiss swept the nation in the wake of V-J Day in World War II. It seemed to capture the bright new hope for the Allies after a turning point in the War.
I don’t think it was a kiss of romance let alone love since the couple wasn’t actually even a couple. And hope? Maybe. But not a shining beacon, but a flicker in the dark. And oh it was dark.
A seemingly endless cascade of it; domino after domino falling made up the war. From the attack on Pearl Harbor 1941 leading to the battles of the Midway, Guadalcanal and to Iwo Jima 1945. That last one had a very different photo as an icon thanks to the Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal. It has since been tied in to American might and victory.
2

The Americans in particular clung to that one too.But it wasn’t the end. Not for either side and the most horrifying strategy signaled the end. In August 1945 the Allies dropped two atomic bombs destroying the cities Nagasaki and Hiroshima. The people. The noncombatants. And even survivors on the outskirts would be slowly destroyed by radiation over time.
So no.
The V-J Day kiss photo. It isn’t romance. It’s an icon of the light at the end of the tunnel a fighting chance the tide is changing. That image was a relief so profound in a time when even the victors of the war when speaking of the era look off with empty eyes. No matter where in the world they were, if they were the aggressor the victim? I can see why the nation grabbed on to that photo with a desperation to see something that looked good ….rather than bodies on the beach among many other photos that haunted the time period.

These days I think about WWII a lot. And I wonder. Is the glossing over of the horror, of the history, part of the reason I see some patterns repeating in realtime?

And at the same time I understand on a gut deep level why it happened: to cope.
… But is that justification enough when horrors are beginning again?