dagblog - Comments for "Memorial Day in America"

Thank you. And thank you to

LisB — Wed, 30 May 2012 01:06:19 +0000

Thank you. And thank you to the comments, too.

AA, when words like these

Ramona — Tue, 29 May 2012 18:25:29 +0000

AA, when words like these resonate after more than a century, even through a half-dozen wars and what seems like mere moments of tentative peace, it should tell us that there is more power in the reflections on the causes for our sorrow that there ever will be in the never-ending rage that keeps those causes going.

Thank you.

P.S. This gets my point

artappraiser — Tue, 29 May 2012 05:29:51 +0000

In reply to I have never understood those

P.S. This gets my point across better:

....Although he had been a doctor for years and had served in the South African War, it was impossible to get used to the suffering, the screams, and the blood here, and Major John McCrae had seen and heard enough in his dressing station to last him a lifetime.

As a surgeon attached to the 1st Field Artillery Brigade, Major McCrae, who had joined the McGill faculty in 1900 after graduating from the University of Toronto, had spent seventeen days treating injured men -- Canadians, British, Indians, French, and Germans -- in the Ypres salient.

It had been an ordeal that he had hardly thought possible. McCrae later wrote of it:

"I wish I could embody on paper some of the varied sensations of that seventeen days... Seventeen days of Hades! At the end of the first day if anyone had told us we had to spend seventeen days there, we would have folded our hands and said it could not have been done."

One death particularly affected McCrae. A young friend and former student, Lieut. Alexis Helmer of Ottawa, had been killed by a shell burst on 2 May 1915. Lieutenant Helmer was buried later that day in the little cemetery outside McCrae's dressing station, and McCrae had performed the funeral ceremony in the absence of the chaplain.

The next day, sitting on the back of an ambulance parked near the dressing station beside the Canal de l'Yser, just a few hundred yards north of Ypres, McCrae vented his anguish by composing a poem....

I have never understood those

artappraiser — Tue, 29 May 2012 05:15:22 +0000

In reply to Memorial Day in America

I have never understood those who feel that Memorial Day (or the equivalent in other countries) is for celebrating the military (or glorifying war for that matter.) To me that's like thinking a funeral is for celebrating death and the Grim Reaper. It's a solemn remembrance, a day to contemplate war's ultimate costs, and to remember the individuals that paid that cost. Veteran's Day is another matter.

Great post, AT. Thanks.

Doctor Cleveland — Tue, 29 May 2012 02:23:25 +0000

In reply to Memorial Day in America

Great post, AT. Thanks.

Thanks to those who have

Elusive Trope — Mon, 28 May 2012 20:10:25 +0000

In reply to Memorial Day in America

Thanks to those who have commented and expressed their feeling, and to those who might do so afterward. Since I take this a day for personal reflection, done collectively, I don't want to personally get into any debates, affirmations, or condemnations regarding anyone's personal feelings and thoughts on the topic. So I am refraining from posting any response to any one response (although I hold the right to jump in should some comment cross the line in my opinion).

I've always endorsed the

Aunt Sam — Mon, 28 May 2012 18:36:28 +0000

In reply to Memorial Day in America

I've always endorsed the sentiment that all those who declare the wars, should arm themselves and theirs, with other like minded cohorts - and make an appointment with 'the other side' and fight it out on the field of their choosing.

If they are so willing to sacrifice others, they and theirs must be first on the battlefield.

What if there was a war and nobody came?
No soldiers. No generals. No heros.
No one to suffer. No one to die in pain.
Who would be killed? How many would lose their lives?
No violent murder for no cause.
No people to shoot with guns, to stab with knives.
Humans kill humans. Can you say that is sane?
Taking precious life. Emptiness now.
What if there was a war and nobody came.

12 April 1993 Charles Fry

I honor, appreciate and praise all our troops. I support Wounded Warriors and hope all here will contribute in deed or other way to a validated Veteran's non-profit.

I held many views in years

stillidealistic — Mon, 28 May 2012 18:20:25 +0000

In reply to Memorial Day in America

I held many views in years passed that I no longer hold.

As a young mother, I spanked my children. As a grandmother, I find spanking to be barbaric, and a total admission that the child has gotten the better of you.

In the Reagan years, "trickle down" seemed to make sense. Now we know it doesn't work, but I thought it was worth trying.

When we went to war with Iraq, I believed our leaders when they said we needed to do it. I didn't like it, but I thought I understood the need. Now, as some one who has been referred to as being "pro war" (which I find as repulsive as being called "pro abortion" because you favor choice) for accepting that, I'd like to say that I really, really hate war.

I hope that someday our country will figure out a better way to solve problems. But it isn't as simple as saying we will NEVER go to war, and anyone who believes that must have a better idea of how to deal with the world as it is than I've been able to come up with.

I respect and admire those who chose the military. It is not an easy life, and you go in knowing you may die as a result of that choice. I'm glad we honor those who make the ultimate sacrifice, even as I look forward to a day when we don't need to add any more names to that list.

Me too!

Richard Day — Mon, 28 May 2012 17:53:22 +0000

In reply to Heartbreaking. And a

Me too!

Heartbreaking. And a

Ramona — Mon, 28 May 2012 16:28:06 +0000

In reply to Memorial Day in America

Heartbreaking. And a necessary reminder. Thanks for doing this today, AT.