George Finkenauer is a man who has always fought off death. Most people couldn’t compare their lives to his. He fights Parkinson’s disease everyday in a hospital bed in Des Moines, Iowa. As a young man, George was a field medic, dropped onto Normandy beach on D-Day in World War II to save injured soldier’s lives, and he later helped liberate Nazi camps in Europe. After the war, he boarded with a family while getting back onto his feet. His incredible character quickly allowed them to treat him like family. Eventually, he married one of the family’s granddaughters, Kathleen, and to this day the two are still in love. He later earned a master’s degree and a career at Firestone. In his retirement, George acquired a job in the Capitol building in Des Moines, Iowa, where he worked until his disease rendered him unable to work.
I never fully appreciated my Uncle George until the day I was asked to assist my Aunt Kathleen in taking him to be honored by the French government for fighting in the war. At the time, I had no idea that he had served in Europe, or that he had even been a soldier. I have since learned that he proudly served, but that it was something of a stigma to him because he didn’t ever talk about the war.
When I arrived in Iowa with my Grandma Carol, she began to prepare me for what was coming. She talked to me about George’s experience in the war and his battle with Parkinson’s. She explained that he could barely undress himself, and that sitting up, walking around, and talking were also very labor intensive tasks. The effects that this disease had on my uncle were hard to believe, until I saw him. I always knew George to be an energetic man who loved to spend time talking with me about baseball, who loved Notre Dame football, and who loved to mow his one-acre yard with his cherished John Deere riding lawn-mower. But now, seeing him lying in a bed, barely able to reach his hand up to shake mine when I walked in the room was an entirely different experience. It was heart wrenching how he didn’t look like the person that he once was.
The day of the event, my grandma and I met Aunt Kathleen at the hospital so we could take George to the Capitol building to be honored. We went into his room, and he was sitting in a chair, preparing himself for the day ahead. He knew this was to be both a physical and emotional day. Even knowing this, he was determined to participate in the event, despite our fears of taking him away from the hospital. Even if he was scared to leave the hospital, and scared to face the memories of that day, he showed us neither.
When we arrived, it seemed that he knew everyone in the Capitol building. He was greeted by so many people who knew him by name; people sought him out, because they had known him some months and years ago. He was a celebrity, not because he was famous in the most common sense of the word, but because he was a genuine friend to every single person who talked to him. He took every hand into his own and looked into their eyes as they talked to him, as if they were the most important person on earth at that very moment. Although, he couldn’t talk very well, he displayed to these people that he loved them, and each knew it well.
After the French ambassador gave a very moving and powerful speech, he asked that all who could stand, to please do so for a singing of the national anthem. I saw George stir in his wheelchair. Nervously, I stood up and watched with amazement. He wasn’t going to let a little bit of Parkinson’s get in the way of properly singing his nation’s anthem. And so, this weak man, who could barely speak, who could barely stand up on a good day, and who should never have left the hospital, stood up. Leaning on a nearby veteran, he gazed proudly at his flag as we all sang. Apprehensively, I stood nearby, but he did not waiver.
I love my Uncle George and I respect him because he had the courage to do things in his life that I can only imagine. He saved countless lives in Europe, and fought Parkinson’s disease. He will always be a man who is loved because he has always shown respect and love for the life of others. God is with George, and shows himself through George in every action, every word, and in everything that George has done in his life.
