We know we are living in changing times when we keep confusing ourselves about how to celebrate our holidays. We get more keyed up about Black Friday than Thanksgiving. Labor Day used to be when workers didn’t work and picnicked instead. But now we live in a 24/7 world where labor never ends and there’s no time to celebrate. Is the Fourth of July a big national picnic with hotdogs and watermelon, or is it a day of ultimate American patriotism, heralded with red, white and blue bunting and fireworks?
And now comes Memorial Day, another promised three-day weekend with a widening sense of schizophrenia. Let’s say it’s OK to share the holiday with veterans’ memorial services and first-of-summer family outings. We can pledge allegiance to our country and have some fun too, can’t we? But lately we’ve been confounding ourselves about who we should memorialize and who we should not. In some parts of America this year, they will be demolishing memorial statues instead of saluting them.
Sounds like we could use a Memorial Day history lesson. But first let’s announce local Memorial Day events that will take place without any confusion.
Next Monday (May 29), at 10 a.m. the Sotoyome Post 111 of the American Legion will hold a Memorial Day commemoration at Oak Mound Cemetery in Healdsburg, followed by commemorations at 11 a.m. at Olive Hill Cemetery in Geyserville and Shiloh District Cemetery in Windsor at noon. A moment of silence will be observed in the memory of all fallen soldiers in all U.S. wars, with extra words of support shared for our country’s active military now serving in areas of conflict in Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.
After the extended weekend, we can “officially” welcome summer, a time when all the local free concert series begin, schools let out and camping, kayaking and backyard barbecues are all in.
Today’s Memorial Day originated as Decoration Day in 1868 when Union soldiers’ graves from the Civil War were decorated in annual ceremonies every May. Separate observances, dating to 1866, also were held across the South offering somber gatherings for the 620,000 killed soldiers on both sides of the conflict, buried in hundreds of battlefield cemeteries.
Since the U.S. Civil War (1861-1865), another 644,000 men and women U.S. soldiers have died at war, most in two world wars and the Vietnam conflict. No war is popular, but some have been less controversial than others. As time passes, we tend to separate our controversies away from the fallen soldiers and limit debates to old politics or policy. We never questioned the morals of GIs in World War II who fought Hitler. But some of our Vietnam veterans came home to calls of “baby killers.” Many of our Iraqi and Afghanistan veterans have come home with clinically diagnosed Gulf War Syndrome and other brain and behavior traumas.
Memorial Day always has been a day when we decorate fallen soldiers without question or reservations. These are men and women who died in our place, in wars that were waged in our names. Perhaps some soldiers die more honorably than others, but who are we to so judge? When a war is over we leave the fallen in silence and undisturbed.
Until now.
This Memorial Day has us fighting the Civil War again. Dozens of Confederate statues are being torn down, some in the middle of the night. Especially across the South, we seem to be rewriting a history book we never read the first time.
How do we “unmemorialize” something that actually happened? We don’t. This Memorial Day would be a good time to remember that our country’s history is written in stone and iron for a reason. We put markers on all soldiers’ grave and not just some. Maybe we’re confused, but let’s not confuse our history, too.
