This Monday, Memorial Day, my wife and I will bring our three children to Claquato Cemetery to respectfully fulfill one small but important part of an American’s civic duty.
This is a day when all Americans, whatever their political stripe or personal background, can and should stand together. We will dedicate an hour of our time to remember those who died in battles fought on behalf this country we share. We’ll ponder that sacrifice, and what sacrifices we all must make to fulfill our many duties and opportunities as citizens.
We’ll see wreaths laid in honor of fallen soldiers.
We’ll stand in respectful silence among veterans, from young women to old men, who fought on our behalf, or for our parents and grandparents.
We’ll remove our hats and bow our heads during prayers of remembrance for their fellow fighters who died in our name.
We’ll be jolted by the harsh cracks of the 21-shot volley.
Afterward, as that solemn spirit slowly lifts, we’ll return to our regular lives with a greater sense of the heavy cost paid so that we might live this life of riches, in what Winston Churchill called “broad, sunlit uplands.”
For many, the event will be deeply personal, as they remember friends who fought alongside them and who never could come back home.
Unfortunately, if this year is like recent years past, there won’t be many other children there for this quiet but important ceremony.
That’s a shame and a lost opportunity for parents to immerse their children in something deep and essential for their development into solid human beings.
My wife’s late father would always take his three daughters to the Memorial Day service at Claquato. It’s become a tradition for our family as well.
I want my children to know and understand that being an American comes with deep obligations.
Their generation may never be called to fight on a battlefield to save the modern world from destruction, but they will certainly have important work to do if we’re going to sustain and expand the ideals that America aspires toward: justice, honor, equal opportunity and a deeply intertwined sense of freedom and responsibility.
No matter your opinion on war, peace, politics or the particular wars in which America has fought, Memorial Day matters to you. It matters to all of us. It’s part of our shared experience as countrymen (and countrywomen).
Attending a ceremony is a duty small and easy compared with what we demand of our soldiers.
I have not fought in combat nor worn the uniform of my country. An event like Memorial Day helps remind me that the good life requires sacrifice.
In our own battlefields here at home in the day to day, we can and must bring forth courage and valor. Our community, country and world still need people to stand up for what is right, necessary and just.
Memorial Day jolts us to honor those who fell, to use their lives and sacrifice to stiffen ourselves for our own battles in making our shared nation a more perfect union.
And to our neighbors whose thoughts go back to troop transports, to rice paddies, to whumping helicopters, to humvees in the desert, and who can picture fellow service members who never came home, please know that we mourn with you.
We will pay you homage in a simple but important way.
We will remember.
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Brian Mittge will also be learning about dignity at Monday’s event. Drop him a line at brianmittge@hotmail.com.
