A Memorial Day Tribute

Memorial Day really should be a bigger holiday than it is in this country. Or maybe it is just that we ought to get back to what Memorial Day is supposed to be about.

Memorial Day is supposed to be a day on which we stop and honor the men and women that serve, and have served, our country around the world and specifically to remember those that gave their lives to protect what we hold dear. Without these men and women, our brothers, sisters, children and parents, this country would not be what it is today. I can sit here in Massachusetts all day long talking about what we should be doing, but the fact remains that they are the ones that end up "doing" while I am merely "talking" from somewhere completely safe and out of harms way.

I was born in 1972, and have spent most of my life living in a time when Memorial Day has been more about backyard BBQ's, long weekends from work and school, and vacations than it has ever been about honoring our service men and women and veterans. It really is a shame.

We live in a climate where it is easier to take our frustrations about policy out on the military rather than on the politicians who make them. We did it after Vietnam by ignoring the troops that were lucky enough to come home. We minimized Desert Storm, Panama and Grenada because they simply didn't last long enough and not enough of our men and women died to call them a true "war." We are doing it now by bitching about the war in Iraq. It is a hard distinction to make all the time between the policy makers and the people who carry them out, but it is one that must ALWAYS be made. Be pissed all you want at the folks in Washington who are safe and sound in their backyards and country clubs this Memorial Day, but say a prayer for the ones that they sent into harms way and who have gone with hardly a complaint because it is their job.

It was my grandfather who taught me that I couldn't really depend on history books to tell the whole story. His stories about World War II and what he actually experienced drove home the difference between the realities of military service and what history chooses to remember. It is because of him, and other veterans I have had the priviledge and honor to meet and talk to, that I realize the magnitude of the sacrifice military service so often brings.

For all the people serving in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guard: All I can say is THANK YOU! It is because of you that I feel proud to be an American, it is because of you that America is something to be proud of. Whether you served during peace time or war, this day is for you and most importantly this day is for those who gave everything so the rest can have their long weekend and BBQ.