This document is an old oil painting, untilled « The American Way of Life ».

It was painting by Norman Rockwell in 1944, during the WW2.

This painting shows a soldier who is feeding a little girl. The girl seems to be 5 or 6, the soldier seems to be 35 or 40.

The scene takes place in a house, looks neglected, or destroyed.

Colors look like vintage postcard. This painting is anyway very realistic, it looks like photography.

The painting is centred on two characters.

There is a contrast in that the soldier, who is expected to be doing the war, who has a submachine gun, feeding this girl. Maybe he takes a kind of break, a moment of sweetness after the horrors that he has probably seen.

Despite the fact that he is a soldier, he has a facial expression very sweet, very calm, and friendly.

As to the little girl, she’s not afraid, even if there is a gun just next to her.

Maybe for the soldier, the little girl reminds him his own daughter. What inspires him probably some pain. And, maybe the girl has lost her parents and this soldier is for her a parental figure.

Maybe they will run away together, we’ll never know.

I find this painting very beautiful, it shows that even during the war, people don’t behave like always animals, people without heart, and keep inside them love, and kindness.