A Smile for Memorial Day
May. 29th, 2006 09:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
margoeveEarlier today ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
schrathe made a post about a TV anchor just not getting what this day is about. She basically said to a bunch of Service Men and Women, "Smile, it's Memorial day."
For those very few of you on my Friends List who may have forgotten that this isn't a day just for BBQs and a day off from work, Memorial Day is a "holiday" in which to remember those who have fallen while in service to our (The USA) country. Not to be confused with Veterans Day, which is for ALL who have served.
So needless to say, the TV Anchor came across as "just not getting it."
But it got me thinking. (Always a dangerous thing.)
I've been thinking about the need for such holidays a lot lately. I suppose it comes from a natural extension of meditating on Burke's Definition of Humans. I also remember seeing something on the discovery channel about how pre-language (pre-religion?) humans did not bury their dead but instead left them, as if they would wake up again, and kept moving on. All of this has been spinning in my mind as I've read quite a few articles this past weekend about people wanting to move the observation of Memorial Day back to May 30th, and of the sad pictures of family members holding dog-tags and uniform hats of their Sons, Daughters, Siblings, and Spouses who have died in service.
So, I've been kicking around some ideas on the subject in my brain. The flaky anchorschrathe mentioned at first sounds like an idiot telling people to smile when they are supposed to be remembering their fellow service members who have been killed. But when I think about it, why shouldn't they smile? THEY are alive.
I'm not talking about schadenfreude. I'm talking about understanding that their lives could be snatched at any time and enjoying every minute of whatever life they have left. I'm talking about choosing to remember those have fallen with stories about them, things they have done, contributions they have made that have touched us all, and maybe laughing at the tellings.
Instead of honoring the dead with moments of silence, why don't we have moments of stories? In silence there is death and death is nothing more than a husk of a human being left behind by those without language to understand it. In story telling, there is immortality. I know nothing of The Iraq wars, Viet-nam, Korea, WWI or WWII except from those who are willing to tell the stories. All I know of most of the fallen are a list of names with no meaning and the headline of how many more died this week in Iraq. Where are their stories?
I do not believe we have memorials, or funerals for that matter, for those who have passed on. Those who are gone have moved on to whatever is next, it is us who are left behind who have to deal with the void they have left. So we have them because we who still live need them. We need to remember. We need to think there is something more to death than senselessness. We need to be reminded that life is short and measure our lives in those who touch them.
Do memorials, funerals, and other remembrances need to be filled with somber sorrow and tragic loss?
I think of stories I hear of Irish funerals that are filled with drinking, dancing and storytelling about the deceased, and I think, "No, no they don't."
So yes, this TV anchor was flaky. I didn't see the broadcast but there is a good chance that this anchor, like me, can't remember a time when it wasn't observed on the last Monday of May as opposed to May 30th. Like me, this anchor is probably a "babe of history" and so I say "Out of the mouth of babes..." because her on-air gaff actually contained some accidental wisdom in it - "Smile, It's Memorial Day."
Yes, smile. Smile because you are alive and someone cared enough about your life, liberty, and freedom to make the ultimate sacrifice in ensuring it. Smile because you knew someone who sought the honor of protecting those they love by serving a cause greater than themselves. Smile, because of them we can have our BBQs and our parades and come together and enjoy the company of those still living. Smile because they would not want you to weep more than you have to.
Smile because they will live forever if you tell their story. Tell me a story and make me smile. Tell your child a story and make them smile and they can know the person that is gone. Tell the world a story so all can smile and they will not have died in vain.
So, I choose to remember the fallen not by how they died, but by how they lived. If I am a flake or "not getting it" because of this, then so be it. I prefer to believe that it's the smiles that make all the death and destruction that come in times of war and conflict seem less senseless, not the tears and silence.
schrathe made a post about a TV anchor just not getting what this day is about. She basically said to a bunch of Service Men and Women, "Smile, it's Memorial day."For those very few of you on my Friends List who may have forgotten that this isn't a day just for BBQs and a day off from work, Memorial Day is a "holiday" in which to remember those who have fallen while in service to our (The USA) country. Not to be confused with Veterans Day, which is for ALL who have served.
So needless to say, the TV Anchor came across as "just not getting it."
But it got me thinking. (Always a dangerous thing.)
I've been thinking about the need for such holidays a lot lately. I suppose it comes from a natural extension of meditating on Burke's Definition of Humans. I also remember seeing something on the discovery channel about how pre-language (pre-religion?) humans did not bury their dead but instead left them, as if they would wake up again, and kept moving on. All of this has been spinning in my mind as I've read quite a few articles this past weekend about people wanting to move the observation of Memorial Day back to May 30th, and of the sad pictures of family members holding dog-tags and uniform hats of their Sons, Daughters, Siblings, and Spouses who have died in service.
So, I've been kicking around some ideas on the subject in my brain. The flaky anchor
schrathe mentioned at first sounds like an idiot telling people to smile when they are supposed to be remembering their fellow service members who have been killed. But when I think about it, why shouldn't they smile? THEY are alive.I'm not talking about schadenfreude. I'm talking about understanding that their lives could be snatched at any time and enjoying every minute of whatever life they have left. I'm talking about choosing to remember those have fallen with stories about them, things they have done, contributions they have made that have touched us all, and maybe laughing at the tellings.
Instead of honoring the dead with moments of silence, why don't we have moments of stories? In silence there is death and death is nothing more than a husk of a human being left behind by those without language to understand it. In story telling, there is immortality. I know nothing of The Iraq wars, Viet-nam, Korea, WWI or WWII except from those who are willing to tell the stories. All I know of most of the fallen are a list of names with no meaning and the headline of how many more died this week in Iraq. Where are their stories?
I do not believe we have memorials, or funerals for that matter, for those who have passed on. Those who are gone have moved on to whatever is next, it is us who are left behind who have to deal with the void they have left. So we have them because we who still live need them. We need to remember. We need to think there is something more to death than senselessness. We need to be reminded that life is short and measure our lives in those who touch them.
Do memorials, funerals, and other remembrances need to be filled with somber sorrow and tragic loss?
I think of stories I hear of Irish funerals that are filled with drinking, dancing and storytelling about the deceased, and I think, "No, no they don't."
So yes, this TV anchor was flaky. I didn't see the broadcast but there is a good chance that this anchor, like me, can't remember a time when it wasn't observed on the last Monday of May as opposed to May 30th. Like me, this anchor is probably a "babe of history" and so I say "Out of the mouth of babes..." because her on-air gaff actually contained some accidental wisdom in it - "Smile, It's Memorial Day."
Yes, smile. Smile because you are alive and someone cared enough about your life, liberty, and freedom to make the ultimate sacrifice in ensuring it. Smile because you knew someone who sought the honor of protecting those they love by serving a cause greater than themselves. Smile, because of them we can have our BBQs and our parades and come together and enjoy the company of those still living. Smile because they would not want you to weep more than you have to.
Smile because they will live forever if you tell their story. Tell me a story and make me smile. Tell your child a story and make them smile and they can know the person that is gone. Tell the world a story so all can smile and they will not have died in vain.
So, I choose to remember the fallen not by how they died, but by how they lived. If I am a flake or "not getting it" because of this, then so be it. I prefer to believe that it's the smiles that make all the death and destruction that come in times of war and conflict seem less senseless, not the tears and silence.
