Welcome to Tuesday, May 31 Conversation

Over Black Coffee and Gunpowder Tea

served with 

Mid afternoon, yesterday, I received the following Memorial Day writing. It is never to late to think about those who gave their life for our country.

Roger Summers served as an Editorial Writer for the Fort Worth Star Telegram news paper.

Yesterday at 5:11 AM  · 

THEY GAVE US TODAY

They went away to places they maybe had never heard of, could not spell, could not pronounce.

Places like Marne, Meuse-Argonne, Bell eau-Wood.

Places like Leyte, Okinawa, Guadalcanal, Saipan, Iwo Jima, Normandy.

Dien Bien Phu, Saigon, Baghdad.

Other places, too.

So many other places. 

They went away in great numbers.

And did not come back.

Young. 

Or just past young.

Ripped, yanked from the lives they had known.

Away from the umbilical cord of home.

Sent away on bouncing, rolling, smelly ships and roaring, crowded, shaky airplanes. On buses, trains.

Frightened. 

Homesick.

With no idea when they might get back, if ever. 

Duty, loyalty, purpose summoned them.

And, in the end, duty, loyalty, purpose, claimed them.

Claimed them in great numbers, numbers too large to precisely count, exactly know.

So on this Memorial Day we remember them.

Proudly, reassuringly the flags will gloriously wave, tugging mightily at the heart, soul.

        Majestically, buoyantly the bands will call up the tunes – the fanfares, overtures — that inspire.

Bring lump to throat. Tear to eye.

In person, in photographs, in videos and in the mind’s eye we will go to the national cemeteries and other cemeteries where those who went away are at deserved, honored, peaceful rest.

There, where the row upon endless row of markers collectively, soberly, somberly remind of the incalculable price extracted.

Paid so those here on this Memorial Day can go on, be all we might be.

To pursue fulfillment and its proffered cup-runneth-over blessings.

        And those who come after us can too.