What matters most on Memorial Day
Parents embrace their children as they are about to depart for service in the military.
"We are proud of you. Please be safe. Please come home."
The sounds of war.
They arrive at boot camp, to have a drill instructor scream at them through grueling training. But there are shouts of congratulations when they make it through.
The sounds of war.
They are at one moment silent and steeled in preparation of the looming battle. And then the quiet is shattered by the zing of bullets, the whistle and roar of artillery, the cries of the mortally wounded.
The sounds of war.
The parents weep over a flag-draped coffin. Taps are played. Words about the courage of the fallen soldier are said, and then the heartbroken crowd departs, leaving the wind to mournfully sigh through the trees on the hallowed ground.
The sounds of war.
The hamburgers and hot dogs sizzle on the grill. There is the click, click, click of the pop-tops being pulled on the beverage cans. There are cheers for the home run, in the stadium or on the television screen. There are cries of delight over the first dip into the pool.
The sounds of war -- forgotten.
Nary a word, on Memorial Day, about those who died in service to their country.
That is not how it should be.
There is nothing wrong, of course, with having a good time over the holiday. The Memorial Day weekend has also become a celebration of the approach of summer.
But Memorial Day should never be diminished to merely a day to have fun.
Take some time, in your own way, to pay solemn tribute to those who have died in armed conflict. It's not as if we are so far removed from war, in our history, that we should struggle in our minds to keep Memorial Day in its proper context.
We are fighting wars, now, in Iraq and Afghanistan. And many men and women from our own neighborhoods have died in these conflicts.
So have many others in the Gulf War, Vietnam, Korea, the world wars, the Spanish-American War, the Civil War. And on foreign soil in Grenada, Panama, Beirut and Somalia.
There are things we should forget about. A bad blind date. A horrible job. The car that always broke down.
But we can never forget those who went to war, into a hell on Earth without peace, and died in battle. When we purge them from our memory, find no place for them in our souls, we are not only showing callous disregard for their sacrifice. Once we forget they mattered, war becomes that much less an evil. Its sounds drown out the cries for peace.