I feel that my life is crashing down and I know ominously that it will have soon ended. I have heard rumours of conscription but with naïve hope I always believed there would be some plucky young boys eager to fill the rapidly appearing gaps in the army's regiment. No longer though, I am forced to face it.

It is now common knowledge, although the true extents and horrors or delights - I do not know are unknown, that people, do die. When we were heralded by the news of the first deaths, it was a tragedy - now it is a statistic.

Nevertheless, I have finally been forced to don a uniform and wield a gun and shoot.and kill. That act has always been the product of childish fantasies and play times, and now that child is going to be shoved into the reality, where the stretches of its imaginations are taut and are realised. And then life goes on beyond the boundaries.

I must admit I don't want to. I really don't want to. But I must. I'm being forced, herded into ravenous mouths like a rabbit flushed from its hole, and blundering right into the snare.

You know, Dr. Barrow told me it's unhealthy to be a pessimist, and unnervingly he spoke of glory and hope alongside with casualties and deaths. He seemed to regret how his profession meant he could not be shipped off and he wished me the best of luck on my venture. Is that how I once too thought? Was I walking with my eyes and ears clamped - ignorant to what is happening? Are my eyes now open, or is this a brief moment of rousing - between the peace of dreams and delusions and the calamity of actuality.

It is slim relief to know that my childhood comrades and my modern gentlemen are all heading into the same frenzy. Even greater relief comes from knowing that my childhood tormenter, a round spiteful boy, will be joining the mêlée as well and it gives me vengeful pleasure to know he might be killed.

I am ardent not to lose a comrade, thus I am bringing along one which I hope will stay with me. This diary. It is said that books are the best friends you can have, they are quiet and constant. Always there, and they are wise counsellors and patient teachers.

Considering of what I will bring with me makes my stomach lurch at what I must leave behind.

My profession. A struggling writer is not necessary to the functioning of society and thus I am torn from my passion. And then.what some? My parents have both passed away and I am but an only child. A sweetheart? Unheard of! What have I to offer, I can barely support myself. The irony of that which I dread most might be best for me, revolts me. Fate must be playing a cruel trick.

And thus I return full circle from my jabbering and my musings. The whole nation currently cries and screams and pleas for sons and husbands to return and crest the horizon and breathe. Just breathe. Breathing is all that matters. Just as we are concerned with breathing, so they are just concerned with how many the Germans can eat up before they are full and bloated, before their hands stained with blood grow weary and falter. Canon-fodder. That's what we are.

And we're doing the whole world a favour.

Paris
Age 13

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