Some columns are easier and quicker to write than others. Some
just miraculously pop into my head and transfer onto the keyboard,
and others have me pondering for days on end. This is one that has
been a tad more challenging and much more emotional than others.
And as I write through my tears, please hold those just like me in
your prayers and thoughts.
Some columns are easier and quicker to write than others. Some just miraculously pop into my head and transfer onto the keyboard, and others have me pondering for days on end. This is one that has been a tad more challenging and much more emotional than others. And as I write through my tears, please hold those just like me in your prayers and thoughts.
We now have a date for the second deployment for our Marine son, and this one will be much different. I know too much now. I have seen and felt and cried too much. I’ve talked with parents right after the phone call came from the battlefield of Iraq about their child’s life-threatening injury.
The conversations with loved ones about coping with the loss of a limb, and the dreams that surrounded the life before. I’ve been to funerals of young people taken much too quickly and whose parents and spouses live with one foot in heaven and the other on earth.
I worked on raising awareness of our Fisher Houses where families of our vets can stay. Those in our area from Operation Iraqi Freedom suffer from brain or spinal injuries or post traumatic stress syndrome. I’ve helped make squares for the quilts given to comfort the families of our fallen heroes and sewed cooling neck ties for our troops when it gets to be 140 degrees in the shade.
This deployment is different, I am different. On my bookshelf is the picture from last year’s Memorial Day in Iraq that the Times printed, along with the picture when he first left, the one where he is peering out the back window wondering when he will be home again. I, too, wonder as word is that this tour will be longer than the last. Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, a birthday – all in a place far, far away.
And so this Memorial Day, post your flags, buy the red poppies to support your disabled veterans, those young and old, thank someone who has served to keep this country free and also thank their families. Gilroy will be having their Memorial Day parade. In Morgan Hill will have our observance at 9am Monday at the Veterans Square, Monterey and First streets in the downtown, and flags again will be placed on the gravesites of our veterans.
Take this opportunity to teach your children that Memorial Day is the day set aside – a sacred day to remember our fallen heroes, and to remember the families and friends of those left behind. Tell them freedom is not free, it comes at a huge sacrifice and cost. Do not think in terms of thousands of casualties, but think in terms of one life, one love, one heart, one soul, one dream. Because this fallen hero, this casualty, was and still is someone’s loved one.
In closing, some thoughts to ponder: if you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture or the pangs of starvation, you are set apart from 500 million other people in the world. If you can attend a spiritual/church meeting without fear of harassment, arrest, torture or death, you are more blessed than 3 billion people in our world. If you have food in the refrigerator, clean clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep you are richer than 75 percent of this world. If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and some spare change in a dish you are among the top 8 percent of the world’s wealthy.
If you can read these words, you are more blessed than 2 billion people in the world who cannot read at all. These blessings have come at a cost, and we have the defenders and protectors of our country to thank.
I will always remember LCpl Jeramy Ailes and the price he as well as his parents, friends and community have paid. My prayers are with you, and for my son and those preparing to depart with him, God speed.
Mary Ellen Salzano is a Realtor for Century 21 Premier. She lives in Morgan Hill with her husband and two children. Her column is published monthly. Contact her at ma***************@***oo.com
