A Salute to Veterans

Every once in a great while a book can completely change a person's attitude. When I was a teenager I harbored the self-righteous opinion that serving one's country in the military was NOT a noble calling. A waste of time and resources, I believed. And then at the age of 18, I read Battle Cry.
 

Written by World War II veteran Leon Uris, Battle Cry was a chronicle of the exploits of a United States Marine regiment. The story is told through the eyes of a battle-hardened sergeant from training recruits in boot camp through the jungle fighting on Guadalcanal to the island-hopping campaign in the Pacific that culminated with the regiment's final battle on the coral atoll called Tarawa. The effect Battle Cry had on me as a teenager rippled outward across decades to the man who is now on the back nine of his 40's.
 

As a result of Battle Cry, I spent the entire 90's reading nothing but non-fiction biographies and histories of the American Civil War. I visited Gettysburg and Washington, D.C. The first decade of the new millennium was spent immersed in World War II. A study of Korea and Vietnam followed shortly after.
 

At first it was names and dates that held my attention. Places such as Gettysburg, Antietam, Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima. People like Lincoln, Grant, Lee, Eisenhower, MacArthur and Roosevelt. But these people and places were too distant and mythic to humanize. So, my attention returned to people just like us. And I was astounded.
 

The average American veteran is the old gentleman in his late 80's or early 90's who now lives a few houses down the block or at the local senior center. Or he is someone's grandfather who spent a year in Vietnam. He doesn't talk about it. Or she is a nurse who went to Vietnam or Europe or the Pacific or the Middle East and served in Army hospitals caring for the wounded. Her experience utterly changed her. Or he is still not yet 30 years old but feels like he's 50. He didn't expect to see this much suffering and death in his lifetime, let alone in just a year or two in Iraq and Afghanistan. Returning to the "world" has been difficult, sleep elusive, relationships strained.
 

They all endured hardship for our benefit. Their training allowed them to do things both gallant and gruesome. Their faith was tested. Their conscience questioned. They soldiered on.
 

For the last 12 years I have had the good fortune to host a Veterans Day program at the middle school where I work. This experience has allowed me to put faces to the average American veteran. And I have found there is nothing average about them. Oh sure, not all had exploits that were monumental. But, regardless, all their sacrifices were.  Whether in peacetime or war, voluntarily or via a draft - servicemen and women postpone their futures, their dreams, their lives.
 

They humble me. I am in awe of them. Whether they never heard a shot fired in anger during their entire tours of duty, American veterans - past and present - have earned our highest praise. We can disagree with the U. S. government's mission in foreign lands throughout our history, but we cannot disregard the men and women who were "on the ground". They did their duty, carried out orders, shouldering the nation's burden.
 

And they can never be abandoned after their service has ended, ever. Their government owes them that much, and more. But what can we - as individuals - do? Simple. Shake their hand. Thank them. Recognize their sacrifices for what they were and still are - Heroic.