The price had no sales tax added

The sun hasn't come up on this 2009 Memorial Day. I woke up and got the dogs walked and made a cup of coffee and came in and sat down. Best time to create and think is just about now. I look out the window and see the trees and plants moving in the pre-dawn light. It's a fresh feeling, a time of renewal. So different for many whom we celebrate today.

In thousands of stories, those who stood in the gap, had their lives end just before dawn-in the darkness, days very similar to what I am looking at. The day captured thousands but there is something about the night that cuts to our primal fears. The Boogieman loves the dark and dwells there. The fears we have as children of darkness and things that go bump in the night are, almost always fictional. Parents scramble out of bed to the night terror cries of their kids who are having a bad dream. We tell them no one is going to hurt them and everything is just fine. It is fine, for most of us. But for those in this photograph and countless others, the night brought with it the fear of those things that live in closets and under beds.

So, you're nineteen and are in some beauty spot like Guadalcanal, a sandy Normandy beach, Mogadishu, the Mekong, or Tikrit and you are on patrol, or with a long-range patrol (LRP), or standing a post. It's night, and you know about the Boogieman. You know he's real. You know he exists. Yet, you continue to do your job. Where do we get such men and women who can look under the bed and then crawl under it with those things that go bump in the night?

Now, don't make them Supermen or Superwomen. They will be the first to tell you they're not. They are scared. Have you ever been scared? No, really scared of something that was real; it breathed and wanted in the worst way, to look you in the face while it took your life. That kind of fear. Knowing that something so vile was right there-waiting just for you. And yet you took steps forward, not backward. Something moves these people. Yeah, it could be for love of country or honor. I don't think all that political crap applies. I think what moves these men and women, who stepped into the vastness of fear, was a motivation of the heart. That's the only thing that could move the body in such conditions. Now, maybe their hearts were motivated by their love of protecting their country or their family or getting even for sins against them. Most of them would tell you they did it for each other, the person to their left and right. God is the only one who knows.

So, these people that we celebrate today, what do they want us to do today? Do they want us to wear black and mourn their passing all day? If we have lost one, we probably feel like doing just that. Everyone of these fallen this country loses, we should take personally. That is a good healthy reaction. I think they want us to enjoy what they bought.We live in the greatest country in the history of the world. Sorry Canada. You're real nice but you know we're right. I'm looking out my window into a nice yard-a yard-with grass! NO ONE in Iraq has grass. I'm listening to Aretha on the radio right now. They shoot people in Mogadishu for listening to a female singer. We get upset standing in line at the grocery store wondering why they don't open another lane because there's four of us in this line. I counted yesterday, there are eleven different bars of soap at the store. Eleven! Whole towns in most of the places we sent troops don't have soap, of any kind. I can even decide if I want to go to work, or live under the 7th Avenue bridge. My life, and that of my family's is our choice. I can follow God or pray to Ulsa, goddess of the pond trees. I can be a professional taxidermist or President of the United States. Its up to me. Those we think of today bought that for me.

When people complain about the U.S. and are here from other countries, I don't think we should say, "Hey, ya knucklehead, go home then." I think we should say "Stay and take another look. You obviously missed something the first time. Forgive them Father, for they don't know what they are saying." We wear our worst on our sleave. You want to know what issues this country has? Read the paper or watch the news or listen to the radio. We'll tell you. Our worst day, beats most nations best. That 7th Avenue bridge thing? That's good living in some countries.

So, today is Memorial Day. This weekend-where did you go, what did you buy, what did you bring to the picnic, soccer game, NASCAR event, Indy race, come on, what did you do? We did everything we could except what we should have been doing; going around and kissing, full on the lips, every veteran of any war, conflict or dispatch we could find, then looking them in the eyes and saying nothing. Just making that eye contact; they will know what we mean. I don't care if you're sitting there coughing and saying "Well, ah, Mark, I know what you want to say, but I just don't feel comfortable kissing another man...." Git you're scrawny, phobic ass over it! That's not the point. As I get older, I am finding myself losing my tolerance for whatever it is I feel I am losing tolerance for. Whatever the heck that just meant. These people, the ones that survived, are the living legacy to the ones that paid the bill for us. This prize we call life, was paid first on the cross, the gold standard to follow. Then, it was paid by millions of men and women. Thousands are standing that same post today. Anywhere the weak need protection or violence happens and that special kind run to help, the soldier, sailor, marine, airman, coast guard, police, or fire. These people go to the noise rather than flee from it. They know the potential is there that they will come face to face with the Boogieman.

Some people think that God has nothing to do with this. I honor your ability to believe what you wish. But I find it impossible to separate the two out. There is an old saying "there are no athesists in foxholes." Before our son, Travis, went to Iraq, we all met as a group. The 63 Combat Regiment has a motto. All units do. Now, some of you might be thinking "Oh, what is it? Gut 'em when you find 'em or some other violent chest pounding rhetoric?" Nope, his combat unit's motto was from Isaiah 6, "Send me Lord."

Where do we find such people to pay the sales tax on our enjoyment on this life? We find them in the homes we have made. From our teaching and our our own hearts. Those that died, they came from us. They mimicked our hearts and minds. They are us and we are they. This is "our day" the best and brighest would say. Remember them, cherish them, kiss them full on the lips.