What Memorial Day Means to Me
Posted: Tuesday, May 19, 2009
by Arlene Wright-Correll
http://www.learn-america.com
When I was a child growing up in Brooklyn , New York , Memorial Day wasn't called Memorial Day. It was called Decoration Day and the Veteran's organizations such as the VFW or Veterans of Foreign Wars stood on street corners taking donations for paper poppies. People gladly "purchased" them for a few coins and proudly wore them in their lapels.
Small flags festooned the tenements of our neighborhood on that day and everyone was proud of their service people.
WWI and WWII were fought for a purpose. We were Americans and we were proud of it with nothing to be ashamed of unlike today's leaders who feel they must appease every nation on the planet or in the UN.
As a child I can remember the small flags in the windows of the tenements indicating how many members, usually husbands, son, or male members of a family, were either serving their country during WWII. Some flags indicated having a member dying for our country.
Many families made pilgrimages to their local cemeteries to put flowers, especially geraniums on the graves. For many families it was a time of family gathering picnics and sporting events usually baseball games and horseshoes.
Today, for me, Memorial Days are times to remember two grown sons who have passed on before their parents. Not a natural way of things, but one must live with reality. For me it is not going to the cemeteries to visit their graves each year, but to plant a tree for each of them. One, a brave soldier, died in 2000 at the age of 40 from the effects of Desert Storm Chemicals which according to our government do not exist. The other, a good human being, died at the age of 45 from a broken heart.
It does not take a special day for me to remember these special boys as they are remember each and every day I am on this planet. Some days I am glad they are not here to see how our country is deteriorating and being led away towards a socialist existence.
As fewer people remember the original Decoration Days, I think some day soon, someone will look back and say whatever happened to Memorial Day?
Painting by Arlene Wright-Correll and can be seen framed by clicking here
"Tread the Earth Lightly" and in the meantime... may your day be filled with... Peace, Light and Love
Arlene Wright-Correll
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Top-level comments on this article: (4 total)Arlene this article is a great way of remembering our loved ones who passed on before us. Their lovely memories we will always cherish. I truly enjoyed your article. Thank you for sharing this.Yes, "Tread the Earth Lightly."Best regards,NenitaYou are most welcome.. thank you for reading my article."Tread the Earth Lightly" and in the meantime.. may your day be filled with... peace, light and love,Arlene Wright-Correll
Arlene, good article. I hope we never reach the place that we forget where we came from, those before us who had a hand in the person we become. I'm sorry for your losses.Thanks for reading my article and for your condolences."Tread the Earth Lightly" and may your day be filled with... peace, light and loveArlene Wright-Correll
Dear Arlene,I just loved this article. I had forgotten about the poppy sale! I am sorry for the loss of both your sons. I certainly admire you for chosing to honor their memories in such a positive way.And your "I heart America" painting was wonderful.Best wishes always,Grammythank you .. I am glad I brought back a memory of the poppy sales. I have not seen them around in a long while."Tread the Earth Lightly" and in the meantime...may your day be filled with...Peace, light and love,Arlene Wright-Correll
Thank you for a great article. Planting trees in honor of your sons is wonderful. I am afraid that if we forget our history, we are doomed.The youth of today rarely learns their history or heritage and many of them learn incorrect things from a current president who seems it is necessary to apologize to basically every nation he visits for something that demeans this great country.Now he is going to germany and will be apologizing for WWII! What kind of history lesson is that?OBAMA TO APOLOGIZE TO GERMANY FOR WWII?
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The latest inconceivable Obamaction is yet another unbecoming apology in Europe, this time in Germany for WWII. John Rosenthal suggests, "As bizarre as it may seem, President Obama’s impending trip to Dresden suggests that German revisionists have a friend in the White House".
And American Thinker adds, "the message Obama intends to send by visiting both sites is clear; while the Germans did bad things during World War II, they were also victims of Allied atrocities."
(Over at Free Republic)
The latest German reports suggest Obama’s principal German destination will be Dresden. According to an article in the local paper Die Dresdner Neueste Nachrichten, representatives of the German and American governments met in Dresden last Wednesday to discuss preparations for the visit. An American security detail is reported to have already scoped out sites in the city: presumably for a public speech.
The symbolic significance of a visit to Dresden by the American president — especially one undertaken in connection with a D-Day commemoration in France — may be missed by some Americans, but it is absolutely unmistakable for the German public. For Germans, Dresden is the symbol bar none of German suffering at the hands of the Allies. The city was heavily bombed by British and American air forces in February 1945, toward the end of the war. According to the most recent estimates of professional historians, anywhere from 18,000 to at most 25,000 persons died in the attacks. These numbers come from a historical commission established by the city of Dresden itself. But far higher numbers — ranging into the hundreds of thousands — have long circulated in Germany and beyond. The bombing of Dresden is commonly described as a “war crime” in German discussions.
Alleged crimes committed by the Allies against Germans and Germany have indeed become a sort of German literary obsession in recent years, with numerous books being devoted to the subject. The taste of the German public for the theme was made particularly clear by the enormous success of author Jörg Friedrich’s 2002 volume The Fire [Der Brand], which is about the Allied bombardment of Germany. The book’s success was so great that Friedrich and his publisher quickly followed up with a picture book on the same topic titled Scenes of the Fire: How the Bombing Looked.
Obama should spend the day tending to the graves of our brave and glorious dead, who sacrificed their lives so that Europe could live on to descend into a pathetic, amoral collectivism. Europe owes us an apology for squandering our blood and treasure on a morally bankrupt transnational gobbledy goop EU wallowing in pathetic collectivism.
Time for a history lesson. What better day to teach the foreign exchange student in the White House a lesson about American exceptionalism, heroism, and greatness?
America's European Arrogance (hat tip Joan S)
1. The American Cemetery at Aisne-Marne, France. A total of 2,289 of our military dead. We apologize.Golly we are doomed for sure... at any rate thanks for your kind comment.
Arlene Wright-Correll
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