Memorial Day Perspective

Happy Memorial Day! It is a day we celebrate and honor those who lost their lives serving our country.

When I was seven or 8 years old our Cub Scout Troop marched in a parade. I was asked to carry the American Flag. The Cubmaster placed a leather strap around my neck with a cup on the bottom. He proceeded to place the flagpole into the cup while asking me to grab the flagpole. His last words were to stay in front of everyone and do not let that flag touch the ground. I’m not sure how long the parade route was but by the end it felt like I walked across the State of Ohio carrying a hundred pound stick. As we neared the end there were people waving and shouting at me. My mom was also waving but her yelling was a little more exaggerated. Which if you knew my mom that was not a good sign. As the end is near I’m smiling proud of my achievement. I catch a glimpse of my mom again and now she is not only waving but pointing. She seems to be pointing at the ground. I look down and now knew why her and the crowd was yelling at me. The flag holder had pushed my pants down to my knees. I must have been really focused. I was a proud American who was now showing America a full view of my sparkling white Fruit Of The Loom underwear. A moment never to be forgotten.

Things have changed since that day. Parades are becoming a thing of the past. I also remember while attending Linden Elementary the students would walk over to a war memorial and participate in a short Memorial Day Service. I am sure that ended years ago. I read that the war memorial we walked over to is being refurbished and moved to a park. Why? No one kept up with it, it had been vandalized numerous and somehow it was involved in several car crashes.

When I was young Memorial Day meant I was only a few weeks away from no school for a few months. Summers changed as I got older as we moved from being city slickers to what felt like being Amish. A small farm in the middle of nowhere and I mean nowhere.

As I have grown older, I have come to understand much more about Memorial Day. I took several college history classes that really lead me to trying to understand the reason as to what seemed like a lot of wars. As I migrated in to the work force I was surrounded by numerous veterans. Many from the Vietnam War. As my work life continued I eventually had many Veterans become employees from the Middle East conflicts. We actually had a number of employees who were called up to active duty. I thank God that each one of them were able to come back to work. But for some it was challenging and they eventually moved on. I tried to have welcome back conversations with all of those who came back.

The one thing I learned about my conversations with veterans and this was for a person who likes to ask a lot of questions. Let them talk. They will tell you what they want to tell you. With many conversations there always seemed to be another part not being told. I eventually figured out why…

My wife worked for a Veteran whose role during the Vietnam War was to do recon for our military forces. He would scout out where the enemy was for our troops. We went to dinner one night and he told me what he did in Vietnam. That was it no stories or any conversation. I was prepared for that based on some things he had said to my wife. Depending on what your involvement was many do not want to talk about it. I later found out he had lost many of his co-soldiers during the war. Sometimes having to watch them die as there was nothing anyone could do to save their life. I’m not sure if everyone I talked to in my office experienced this or not but I’m convinced many observed things they still don’t talk about even today.

We have lost six hundred thousand soldiers from WWI through today. If you add in the Civil War over a million. Four hundred thousand died during WWII. They sacrificed their lives so we could live in a free world. They fought to save people who were Jewish from the Hitler Death camps. In the end six million Jewish people were killed. How many more if it was not for the soldiers who sacrificed their lives. The next time you hear Death to Jews remember this. Americas greatest generation lost four hundred thousand soldiers fighting for their right to be free. Fighting and dying to end one man’s dream of exterminating one race from the face of the earth.

I say to all those who died thank you and no matter what we are hearing and seeing today it was not in vain. I wake up every day thanking God and those who sacrificed for our country.