Memorial Day Reflections
“Our nation owes a debt to its fallen heroes that we can never fully repay.”
-Barack Obama
I stumbled across this quote and it really stuck with me. And not only can we not fully repay, but I think we can never fully understand the immensity of that debt. So today, I want to share with you some reflections on Memorial Day – past and present – and how I offer my respects to our fallen heroes.
My dad is a historian.
He taught American history at the middle school my siblings and I attended (which had its perks – and plenty of embarrassing moments, like walking in to school with “Samuel Meredith” or “Brian the Hippie” on one of his reenactment days…which I NOW can appreciate much more than when I was 13 years old). For several years, he has been researching our family genealogy, tracing it back as far as Samuel Meredith (yes, the same one he dressed up as…) who was the first Treasurer of the United States and served under George Washington. He is now retired from teaching in the classroom, and instead has taken on the role of Town Historian, and teaching in a very different environment – to adults, on the stories and development of our town.
So why do I bring him up in this post about Memorial Day?
My dad was in college during the Vietnam War.
His draft number was high, so his chances of being selected were pretty low – but he still has his draft card (are you surprised?). This was the first time the U.S. utilized a lottery draft, a method which I don’t fully understand and hopefully will never have to. And in thinking about my dad, who turned 70 yesterday, I thought of all of the young men – those who my dad knew maybe from grade school, or drank beers with, or was somehow otherwise connected to – who don’t get to celebrate their 70th birthday, with a quarantine drive-by parade (yep, we did it, and it was a blast!)
How many of those men who lost their lives in the Vietnam War, would have gone on to get married and have children, who would be connected to me, just like my dad was somehow connected to those men? THIS is my realization of Memorial Day. Those men – and now women, too – sacrificed not only their lives, but were never given the opportunity to have children of their own (or to watch their children grow up) … maybe some of my current friends wouldn’t be my friends today if their dad had gone off to war. Their deaths changed the trajectory of countless other lives. Think: butterfly effect. THAT, to me, is astounding – and for some reason, I think I am finally grasping what it means – like President Obama said – to have a debt that we can never fully repay.
My dad, the historian, finds a way to engage his students – whether teenagers or adults – in history. He organized groups of students to mark the graves of fallen soldiers at some of our local cemeteries, around Memorial Day. And Brian the Hippie? “Brian” was a Vietnam-era man, who was vehemently (and sometimes illegally) against the war, and just wanted peace (yes, there may be some internal conflict there). During my dad’s reenactment, which took place in our middle school library on “60s Day”, we sang the chorus from a song by The Youngbloods:
“Come on people now, smile on your brother. Everybody get together, try to love one another right now.”
So today, I want you to take a moment to pause and reflect on the path of your life – and of those who came before you – and how you got here. Because I can assure you, it is not without sacrifice somewhere along the line. And now more than ever in our lives (at least for those around my age, I think), we need to love each other - but let’s hold on the “everybody get together” part for a while longer.
P.S. I’m posting this on Tuesday this week because our parade for my dad’s birthday was a complete surprise … and just in case he read my post yesterday, I didn’t want to be the one to ruin a surprise!