What Is Memorial Day?

God Bless America


What Is Memorial Day?

by

LT Bobby Ross



My years whirl past me. Swirling. Dry, broken grass hovering in a

spring breeze. Can I remember my experiences in war? Hardly. Fighting

for my country, my youth invested, seems such a long time ago, and so

unimportant. The calendar this year marks Memorial Day on the 29th of

May,2000. Have I lost something? The traditional Memorial Day, also known

as Decoration Day, is on the 30th of May. This observed Memorial Day on May

29th coincidentally allows for a national three day holiday. Such is

commercialism's capitalistic American display. But why do I feel so

stricken, like I have abandoned old friends from long ago? Their ghosts

consort with my floating years, and their spirits coast around my presence.

Another three day holiday! Memorial Day! Maybe me and the kids can go

camping? Or, to the beach? Memorial Day is fun! This is the

inconsiderate, thoughtless approach to this meaningful, and consecrated

moment representing one three hundred and sixty-fifth of our year. What is

the meaning of Memorial Day? Is it merely a three day escape from our

worldly duties? Or, is it the official beginning of summer? Is selling

more hot dogs at the ballpark the overriding clarification? Many souls,

sacrificed in war, in duty to America, are wandering. They drift in a

heavenly place, minus their future here upon earth. Tomorrows were forfeited.

Given up so our nation would invigorate free souls, aspire them to

freedom, and justly allow their lives lived as they prefer. Raising

offspring above restrictions, as they desire. Those lost lives giving we,

the living, what we want freely. Those are the souls we respect on Memorial

Day. This means it is a sacred day. Without retrospect, sacrifice is

mute. Old Glory does not wave by accident. It flutters in the spring air

revealing honor. The color red represents the blood bloom from those who

fell, those who clawed, those who cried in horrible pain. Those who died

fast. And, those who died ever so slowly. They did their duty. When I see

Old Glory waving on a sunny, end of May day, the pigment red gushes from

millions of souls, floating, not with us, anymore. They are amongst our

heroes, cajoling with angels with their champions, conquerors and

commanders. Friends and loved ones gather, over the rave, witness to those

who gave more than anyone should be required to relinquish. They did not

want to yield. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time, and when the

moment harshly struck them their fatal blow, they cried for their mother, or

their friend. Then there

were those, many of those, who knew exactly what they were giving. They

moved forward knowingly. They lost their lives so their mission would be

accomplished. Fools! Some intellects can say that. One would have to be

an imbecile to give up life, no matter what the cause. For a flag? Futile!

For a country! More pointless! For freedom! What freedom is there in

mortality? Yes, fools they may have been, but their numbers add up in an

awesome display of American loss! Veterans' Cemeteries, white badges

sailing row after row after row upon green grass, almost never ending,

creeping onto the horizon. Constant reminders of the devastation of our

human treasure. Mothers' tears, enough to fill an ocean to overflow.

Sweethearts, broken hearted, reading telegrams. Sons and daughters, many

unborn, wakening at birth to a devastated family suffering from a victim of

war there no more. And what does all this macabre math equal? Memorial Day

is the correct answer. Few Americans know a person who died in war.

Their family trees have lost some leaves, falling as they fought in one of

America's wars, or discarded in the peacetime military. We are a busy

people. We have business to capture. Our kids are in school. We have

chores. Mundane, or surrealistic. We are a spirited society, seeking

applications to improve ourselves and our communities. We are a helpful

populace, always there when the going gets tough to help those who have

suffered the tragedies of nature, whether a hurricane or a famine.

Americans are always the first on the scene worldwide bearing their gifts of

human spirit and abundance. This is why it is so puzzling that the meaning

of Memorial Day seems to lack substance to many of our own people. Even

with the day itself. Put back to accommodate a holiday schedule fixed by

some organism no one knows, yet powerful enough to do so, the day itself

lacks consequence to too many. Many who never knew a person who died in

service to America are wrought with the invisible pain of not feeling for

those who do. Americans take things for granted. We have so much. So

very much. Endless choices. These options are not available worldwide. Our

shelves are full. Unlike many in other nations of the world. So many are

empty or offer very limited selections. Those American fighting men and

women killed in battle whose souls are floating actually made available

these wondrous choices we have every day of our American lives. Yet, most

of our youngsters have no idea whatsoever what this means. They don't learn

this in school. We must teach them. For without knowledge, they may end up

thinking, or believing, all these marvelous selections came without

circumstance. Minus anything. Equaling no meaning.

Our nation needs to halt and perceive the flags and flowers on our

Veterans graves on this consecrated holiday. We need to lift a common

voice of adoration to those floating spirits of our onetime American

Warriors, and extol them with a salutation. We have not come that far with

our technological miracles of this millennium to become crass. We still

need respect. Our backs can not turn from formality. Our eyes can not look

away from custom. Our voices must not resonate in silence against honor and

glory. To do so will leave us hollow, only to fill us with that which is

desolate and lacking potential. This is not the true meaning of Memorial

Day. The heartfelt significance requires reminding. Story telling. Wisdom

being passed on from our Veterans to our younger generations. An

interpretation certified by those who remember the horrors of war. Without

this core, our society can not remain genuine. It becomes contemptible. It

rots from within. These floating souls of our lost American Warriors are a

powerful force, for they live within our hearts. They constantly seek

justification for their contributions, and they are real within us. Such is

what our American substance stands for, where character is developed,

individually is guaranteed, and a community, a nation, survives.

America enters the 21st Century as the most powerful entity

humankind has ever experienced. America permeates this next century with

vast responsibilities. Our children must bear this promise. We can not

turn our backs on these bygone descendants, nor can we do so upon

ourselves. Memorial Day offers us the opportunity to express a moment of

solitude where each of us can personify in our own way what we feel. I

only speak for my myself, as one who has bared his soul to the dread of

war. So my father did, and his father's father before him, and their souls

float amongst the multitudes. My mother and her mother held their Veterans

after they returned from war, tears streaming down their cheeks in gratitude

for their safe return. And there were those in my ancestry who did not

return from war. And their mothers' tears soaked the pillows on beds for

generations to sleep upon. Their souls are the dreams that drift amongst

the floating, gathering at the end of May in the breeze of summer's coming,

in the cool glass of lemonade at the child's street side stand, in the

cheers at the ball game from the crowd rooting their team to victory and

enjoying the best hot dogs in the world. Let us all stop for a moment,

whether it is on the traditional day, or the observed Memorial Day, or even

at the end of May, and reach for those floating souls. Let us reveal to

them how much we cherish their sacrifice for our free people. Let these

memories harvest our recognition of the meaning of Memorial Day in a very

simple word. And let that word, simply stated be: Thanks.



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that says it all its sad to say that some dont realize what the true meaning of memorial day is thank you for sharing this

from a air force brat
becky