Memorial Day. Contrary to popular opinion, it is not a day set aside to shop sales and host a BBQ. Those things are nice, but they are not the purpose set aside for the day. We are purposeful, as a family, to honor the meaning of “Memorial Day.”
Even though Chris has to work, we spend the morning honoring and education our kids somehow about the soldiers meant to be memorialized. This year we went to the Oregon Vietnam Living Memorial. We have been there before, but never on Memorial Day itself. It is a circular path upward with progressive monuments featuring names and facts of the war itself and things happening “at home” in Oregon during the same time periods. We read sections engraved in the stone as people took turns reading the 800+ names of Oregonian soldiers represented there. Sobering.
As tears welled, the names were resonating in the silence. The men decorated with pins, vet hats and POW emblems lined the path. They stood listening, some stoic, some smiling with their comrades, some wiping away the tears. They were there. They have tangible memories, fears, and pains of the war that ended before we were born. They lived the history we read about in books. They have the scars. They were the ones who knew the Americans fighting and dying, at one point, at the rate of 1000 per month. They were the ones who fought while others at home lived licentiously protesting with peace signs. They were the ones who were denied respect due a soldier upon returning home.
I tried to say, “Thank you,” to those I could. The words seemed trivial though they were heartfelt. I asked one vet if he knew any of the guys represented by the names on the wall. He said he didn’t. He pointed to the man next to him and quietly said, “His brother’s here.” Every name is someone’s family. This war, unlike older wars, still has so many living that are affected every day. They still suffer and grieve. The pictures that many carry so vividly in their minds are, how I explained to Isaac, like having nightmares after watching a scary movie…only theirs was something they really saw.
As we walked back to out car (in the parking lot shared with the Oregon Zoo), there was a couple who were criticizing the behavior of the American troops in Vietnam. Amidst the pain, there are still the critics who cannot (or will not) refrain from adding their two cents…even for one day. As we saw the crowds gathered in line for the zoo, it was a further picture of how life goes on. Only the distance of a paved parking lot separated the worlds of grieving soldiers and those who are happily enjoying a “day off.” It was a microcosm of how we go about our every day lives while brave troops, even today, fight on our behalf. Though any good soldier will tell you that they fight to keep the freedoms for Americans to speak their mind and enjoy a safe day at the zoo, it is still right that we remember this day for the purpose for which is was set aside.
Thank a vet. Pray for families who still grieve. Sympathize for soldiers who still struggle with trauma caused by what they saw and suffered. Praise God for the brave men and women who are willing to lay down their lives so that we’d have the freedom to enjoy Memorial Day however we choose to spend it.
