Response to Responsibility to Remembering...

The Roman Empire fell, and although it gave Shakespeare and much of Hollywood a living retelling the stories of toga parties before the frats went wild. Which is a fool way to start a blog about where Western Civilization is going to fall apart again. I think the Romans failed to respond to the changing threats, they wanted someone else to bear the burden. They stopped requiring everyone to serve, they hired the people with little future and sent them out and promised them a retirement in twenty or more years, in far flung borderlands of Latin speakers. If as we get ready to replace the nation's executive leadership in a multi-billion dollar media blitz it is clear the nation is made up of people that don't know there is a war on - somewhere, who our allies are, what our goals are and how we are treating the wounded and maimed and soon to be missing (returning veterans that will zone completely out). But then I know, and lots of others (none in charge it seems) do know, and I care.

One of my links left this mark and it fits my time left. My uncle and father are gone across that river, European Theater and Pacific Theater respectfully and respectively. My mother wrote a poem about being nineteen, her most wonderful year - marriage and first son's birth, and my father said he never was nineteen - which says a lot about his war and where he went.

Anyway, Citizens and well wishers, Memorial Day - the day dedicated to REMEMBERING THE DEAD, is coming. It isn't about the veterans, it isn't about the currently serving (that was Armed Forces Day and you might have missed it - Congress didn't give us a Monday holiday for it). It is about the Dead, the departed, those gone on. If you are in Washington DC, walk in Arlington, visit the graves, markers standing row on row, those mark the passing of a piece of history - our country's history, a little slice. But I would bet, where ever in the world one is, there is a graveyard with a few people sent by their country to do good work, and they did and they died. Go and visit them, talk to the ghosts and spirits, or just think about them - I suspect they live in memory only when we take that time to spend with them.