“We don’t know them all but we owe them all!” A great saying this Veterans Day as this is being written. I swell with pride thinking of our brave veterans who were willing to serve this great country and keep it safe and free. I think of this every time I go to vote, attend the church of my choice, give a salute to the American flag as the anthem is being played, live where I chose, do the jobs I chose to do and not be afraid of being arrested for supporting my country.
I was raised to give honor to this America and the veterans and active service men and service women. Many of my family chose to serve this country, some in the time of war. My cherished veterans are my father, son, husband, uncles, grandfather and my great-grandfather who fought in the Civil War. My father, a WWII veteran, enjoyed attending our local school’s Veterans Day Programs and was often asked to speak to the classes there about his experiences and thoughts of serving his country. How he enjoyed doing that! I am thankful a dear neighbor, Kelly McNichols, worked with the school’s history teacher and class a few years back and made videos of the WWII veterans in this county as they shared their experiences in the service, and my father was one of those recorded. My family and myself have copies of the recording of my father’s service memories.
It’s not just on Veterans Day that we need to recognize and honor our veterans, it should be everyday, thanking them and maybe even asking them to share some of their service memories. At Memorial Day, we honor and cherish the memories of those veterans and service men and women who gave their lives for this country and either didn’t make it home from the battles or years later died. My family is drawn back to the hometown cemetery every Memorial Day to pay honor to our family’s veterans and others. We visit the flag poles with the names of our fathers, uncles and grandfathers on the poles with the American flag waving in the Avenue of Flags. We remember the hometown parades in which they would march in as the American Legion Color Guard and how special that was. Grandfather, a WWI veteran, taught his four sons patriotism and all four served their country, with three of them in WWII all at the same time.
It hurts when marches are held against this country and the American flag is set on fire. If protesters don’t like it here, why don’t they chose to leave and live elsewhere? They don’t know how good they have it here thanks to veterans and other patriotic leaders.
A few years back my husband and I visited Washington D.C. and toured the Arlington Cemetery. We stopped at the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We got to view all the memorial places honoring those of the wars and battles. It was stirring to view.
We must remember “Freedom Is Never Free” and that “This is the Land of the Free because of the Brave!”
Reader Comments(0)