My wife and I walk graveyards as often as we find them. There are stories there, etched and carved in stone.
In the course of our travels we have found the occasional military burial ground. These places hold a more reverent feeling for us than others. The names and dates reflect tough choices and huge sacrifice in the interest of our nation. The hopes and dreams of individuals, but also families, lie unrealized beneath the soil. Whether we feel the wars were more than justified, or not, we hold these fallen to our hearts and thank them for protecting the principles of freedom that this republic was founded on.
And we wonder what the patriots of the past would have to say about the current times and troubles of the present. What would the men at Bataan have to say to us about waterboarding? Would the earliest graves hold opinions about lobbyists and taxation without representation? How would the Irish casualties of WWI have commented on immigration? The dead black heroes of Vietnam, living in the civil rights era, might have something to say about racism in America today.
The thing is, these dead have already spoken. They have laid down their lives, and their futures, to be sacrificed in order that we who are left behind have a better story to tell. Although I’m sure every one of the deceased warriors would gripe if they could about the food, the footwear, and the officers in charge, and might argue about the particulars of any one situation or issue, just as we all do, I am pretty sure they would be proud of their service and the nation they have made.
Sometimes I wonder though: Do they shake their heads at the discord? At the hostility? At the mean-spirited, I’m-not-gonna-listen, it’s my way or the highway, I’m right and you’re wrong, entrenched, politicized, polarized, dissension?
You see, when all is over and done with, we citizens have a responsibility too.
If we are to honor the patriots before us, those sons and daughters who made the ultimate sacrifice, then we owe something to them. Not just that we can live our lives in relative harmony, make the American dream real, or have the right to do whatever we choose. But also to listen to others and change our minds when they speak the truth. To agree with reason, logic, and evidence rather than the loudest angry mouth.
We, those of us that have never been in harm’s way, have as great a responsibility to this nation as those lying under the earth with flags on their graves. We have to make it work. We have to make it better. We owe a debt. A great and burdensome debt if we fail, but an easy load if we make our nation and the world better.
If you can, go visit a cemetery. Visit one with flags flying, holding the hand of someone you love. And think about the thoughts that are silenced beneath the grass.
C. Henry Martens, Salina