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HOST) With the approach of Memorial Day, writer and commentator Anne Averyt has been thinking about how we remember those who have given their lives for the nation.
(AVERYT) Memorials come in all shapes and sizes. I have a piece of the dismantled Berlin Wall. I have Civil War bullets from Gettysburg and Antietam. And I have, from my grandfather, a deep love of history and of country.
I have a vial of volcanic ash a friend collected just weeks after Mt. St. Helen’s erupted. I have a brother who still carries his medals, his soul scars, from a year in the hell that was Vietnam.
Each of these memorials comes with the cost of memory.
Washington, D.C. is the quintessential city of memorials. It glistens at this time of year, an iridescent green, presided over by the obelisk of the Washington Monument, brooded over by a larger than life Abraham Lincoln. In between are the soaring monoliths of tribute to the Greatest Generation, passing quickly now, but always to be remembered.
I remember marching in the streets of Washington. I remember watching riots in those streets, and I will always remember the sight of tanks and soldiers riding down Connecticut Avenue. The year was 1968.
Most of all though, the memorials I remember are the moments of silence and tears, of severed hearts, a crippled nation. I was just a cub reporter when I watched the funeral procession carry the casket of Robert Kennedy beneath the grieving stare of President Lincoln. RFK, on his way to share the earth of Arlington Cemetery with his fallen brother, in the faint glow of an eternal flame.
By definition we do not erect memorials to victory. We build monuments to remember war’s human cost, to honor statesmen who
understand blood is shed to preserve the liberties we hold self-evident.
The simple, stark Wall remembering those who died in the Children’s War that was Vietnam has always moved me in a profound way.
Yet, it is FDR’s heartfelt, weary condemnation of violence as the way to resolve conflict – his words etched into the granite walls of his monument – that speaks what the Vietnam Memorial screams in emotion:
"I have seen war," FDR said. "I have seen blood running from the wounded. … I have seen cities destroyed. … I have seen the agony. … I hate war."
So many years later, so many memories more, as I reflect on Memorial Day, this day of remembrance, I feel sadness and frustration. I wonder how long will it take for the lessons of the past to be learned?
I bow my head in tribute to those who have paid with their lives – lives lost or forever scarred – and remember that every memorial comes with the cost of memory. And I remember …