THE HEROS ARE EVERYWHERE

Our fallen heroes who helped the nation answer the call.  

Many parades today honor our veterans who fought in wars. That's why we're off work - to remember these people.

Of course, the big guns will go off in DC today as a salute to the people who were conscripted or called to answer the "ask" to help others in far away lands be free of oppression as well as here on the home front. The point is men and women have entered the service, died and need to be recognized. 

My parents always called it Decoration Day because, as they explained, "we're going to the cemetery to decorate the graves of soldiers."

Being so young, I thought it was a good-time in a very different kind of park -- a quiet place with upright rocks, lifesize angels, statues of women burying their heads in their hands, pairs of doves always with one on its back.  They taught me the meaning of the limestone cut trees and pieces of airplane as tombstones. There were replica's of medals engraved on the limestone.  And some markers were barely readable they were so old and withstood natures' elements repeatedly. 

We'd read the graves stones, which made history all the easier to understand and ignited my thirst back then. It was a somber experience and one that I'll always remember. I learned terms -- Killed In Action, Missing In Action, awarded the Purple Heart etc. 

And there is always the Eternal Flame to admire. 

On the first Decoration Day in 1868, General James Garfield made a speech at Arlington National Cemetery, and 5,000 participants decorated the graves of the 20,000 Union and Confederate soldiers buried there. 

The South refused to acknowledge the day, honoring their dead on separate days until after World War I (when the holiday changed from honoring just those who died fighting in the Civil War to honoring Americans who died fighting in any war including the Revolutionary War). 

In the mid 1960s, President Johnson changed the name to Memorial Day honoring all wars since the county was established.

But in 1915, the poem Flanders Field (written by a Canadian soldier) pulled at the heartstrings of many countries: "In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, ..."  

Shortly after, Moina Michael, a woman on a mission, came up with the idea of selling poppies in May as a way to help needy soldiers. People donated what they could. Then she took to making paper poppies to help support women and children affected by the war. It soon spread to other countries. 

Like anything, her program needed financial support so she turned to the Veterans organizations who took a second to decide it was an awesome idea. The disabled servicemen sold artificial poppies and the program took off to be what it is today. Our national holiday borne out of foreign influences. 

So this afternoon, stand by your radio or TV at 3PM  for The “National Moment of Remembrance” (passed on Dec 2000) that asks for all Americans “To voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a Moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to ‘Taps.”