Memorial Day

An Essay by John Detwiler, the Produce Peddler

I have imagined, from time to time, what it would be like to know someone who gave his life for me. To have been pushed out of the way of a speeding car, or perhaps been saved from a criminal by a hero who jumped in to wrestle his weapon away.

Knowing that his life had ended, and yet mine continued, what would I do? There is a sense in which all that is now mine, by some right, belongs to him. His obligations, impossible to be paid, would be my obligations.

There is no way out of this argument for gratitude. My life ended, I have nothing in this world. My life saved, I have something. All that I have in this world, then, is a gift from whomever gave it.

But when the gift is so large, and the cost of the gift so great -- how can I ever give enough in return?

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There are many things that could be done, that MUST be done, I suspect.

Those dearest obligations of the fallen, they must be paid, mustn't they? The support of his wife and children, the aid to his aging parents. It is hard to see how one, in the position of the saved, could ignore these debts. Because, surely, the man who died would have asked that they be paid -- and how can I refuse such a request?

And yet, the weight of gratitude is unbearable. I have obligations to my own wife and children, to my own parents. There is work I must do to build up society. Even if I saw a man die to save my life -- I cannot leave my place to take his, to do his work. Yet I couldn't go to bed without seeing his sacrifice, and knowing that I was now beholden to my gratitude.

The challenge, then, is to make one's life an expression of gratitude. How?

-- Suppose, if I were a public figure, and I ended every speech with "I could not be here today, except for the heroic sacrifice of this man."

-- Suppose, every day, I wrapped a colored band around my arm, in memory of the fact that I owed my life to someone else.

-- Suppose I put a picture of the man who saved me inside my house, and every day, I prayed to God for the salvation of his soul and blessings upon all his loved ones.

Each one of these acts would the sacrifice, the debt, and the gratitude, present -- a constant theme. In a sense, my life would be permanently marked, its portrait visibly inscribed with the words: "I owe my life, and give my uttermost thanks..."

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My dear friends, this is why we celebrate Memorial Day. And indeed, why we have to take time on Memorial Day to remember those who died to that America might live, free and strong.

It isn't enough simply to have a party on a long weekend -- though there is a sense in which the deliberate enjoyment of our lives is part of our thanks. The day, Memorial Day, must be marked by remembrance and deliberate gratitude, and the recognition of the costs paid by others for us, our wives, our brothers, our parents and grandparents -- our entire patria, our nation.

-- Suppose that the entire nation gave one day every year, to hold parades, to decorate graves, to pray, to fly the flag, to tell stories about those who died.

Would that mean that our soldiers' sacrifices were not forgotten? Would that mark our collective life as one of gratitude?

Perhaps, if we do this, we make an inscription on the portrait of our lives:

"The debt is unpayable, and we know it. Thank you. May God repay what we cannot."