Memorial Day...a short read.

 Memorial Day..

I was thinking about the people I have known in my life that were military and now passed…It is a pastiche of stories, locations and personalities.

-My darling Father was in the Coast Guard during WW2 but saw no action. He manned a lighthouse off the New Jersey Coast as a 20 something. I remember that he told me that he joined the

Coast Guard as in the CG he would never have to salute anyone…and there was also that cool uniform.

-My Great Uncle Carlon was in the Korean War. He must have seen plenty of action as in his last years he started seeing the enemy everywhere…crawling through the eaves of his house, in the attic, in the basement. 

-My brother in laws brother was in the Viet Nam war and I think he was terribly scarred by it…as you can imagine. I don’t have any details as he never spoke about it but you could feel that he

was always carrying something haunting.

-My next door neighbor, as a child , was in WW2. The details to me are sketchy but I remember Nazi memorabilia in a back and dark crowded basement room. …a rifle? a German helmet? but I cannot remember any details.

-Lastly, my Uncle Jack La Barge…He was in WW2, in Europe, I think Belgium. He was riding in the back of a transport truck, standing and the enemy had stretched a wire across the road…unseen until

the truck passed and severed my uncles chin right off. How horrible. I found out about this long after he died. Knowing him from birth, I knew he was quiet and withdrawn…opposite of my father…

I never knew what had happened to him. He was very ill at the end with cancer of the mouth and jaw.

and I love them all for their service to our country…for their sacrifice. I think of them all today.