I put myself through university working as a nurse. I worked at Shaughnessy Hospital, back when there *was* a Shaughnessy Hospital. It was a Department of Veterans Affairs hospital. So I was working with veterans.
One day, as I was getting one of the old guys up, he mentioned that he was a veteran of two wars. In the full flush of my youthful ignorance, I replied, "Oh, the first world war and the second world war?" No, he replied, the Boer war and the first world war.
So, I knew veterans of the Boer War. I even knew a veteran who had received one of Queen Victoria's scarves, and it was only much, much later in life that I realized the significance of that, and I rather suspect that almost none of you who will read this will, in fact, understand what that was.
But the point that I'm trying to make is that I have known veterans from the Boer War, and the First World War, and the Second World War, and the Korean War. And I knew actual deserters from the American military, and the war in Vietnam. (Yes, there were a lot of draft dodgers who came from the United States to Canada during the time of the Vietnam war, but there were deserters as well.)
And I have known veterans from wars and conflicts since. The list goes on, and the names of conflicts and wars are not less important, but grow too many to list. Although the reasons for remembering the wars do not change, and do not grow any less important, but rather more important.
The veterans from wars that are older and fading into history are dying off. Gloria and I attended one particular Remembrance Day service for twenty-five years. It, like the wars that people might consider less significant, was not a particularly notable service. It was in an old folks home (or "care facility," if you will), and Gloria sang at the service. For twenty-five years. We saw veterans from different wars dying off, over the years. It affected me deeply, because we knew these people (and also because the memories involve Gloria). So much so that, these days, I have difficulty attending Remembrance Day services that are simply pro forma political appearances, rather than services.
I have known these people. They are different people, because people are all different. They had their own reasons for going. Sometimes to save comrades, sometimes to protect family, or communities, or their country. They had different experiences. They had different attitudes to what Remembrance Day was all about.
And as the veterans from different wars, and particular to the First World War, where the whole Armistice Day, or Remembrance Day, or Veteran's Day thing started, people start to wonder what is the point of Remembrance Day.
One thing that we are remembering is that war is hell. War doesn't just affect those who go to fight in it. It does not just affect those from the armed forces, of the various countries involved, and who are actual combatants. War is terrible. It hurts a lot of people. It destroys lives. It leaves injuries on veterans, it leaves injuries on civilians, and in many cases it actually leaves injuries on the land itself. (I have been to the Vimy Memorial, on the crest of Vimy Ridge. Signage warns you to stay on the paths. Sheep graze on the grass. The sheep leave behind droppings that might make walking on the grass a bit messy, but that is the least danger that you face by walking on the grass. The sheep are there because that is the safest way to keep the grass trimmed. [Well, maybe not for the sheep.] The battle of Vimy Ridge started on my birthday in 1917, more than a hundred years ago, and there is still ordinance there that makes it too dangerous to run a tractor lawn mower over the grass, let alone allow tourists to wander on it.) War is terrible, and we should always remember that we should take every effort to avoid war.
We also need to remember those who go to war. We need to remember, with gratitude, the thin Blue line, or the thin Red line, or the thin camouflage line, or whatever color we use and choose to represent those who, for whatever reason, go to stand in the gap on our behalf.
We need to remember those who went, and did not return, and made the ultimate sacrifice on our behalf. We need to remember those who went, and who did return. All of those made a sacrifice. Sometimes the sacrifice was time. Sometimes the sacrifice was friendship, with their comrades who made the ultimate sacrifice. Sometimes their sacrifice was injuries and disabilities, and losses of others sorts.
We need to remember that a sacrifice is a sacrifice, in the same way that, in regard to grief, a loss is a loss. After Gloria died, I was having coffee, on a fairly regular basis, with a fellow whose wife was still alive. He didn't understand the grief of the loss of his spouse. He kept on asking me what it was like. I would try to explain what grief was like. He never did understand, but he did keep on asking, and it was kind of him to keep on asking, and to try to understand, in opposition to the great many people who did not understand, and who tried, sometimes rather desperately, to avoid the subject or any thought of that kind of loss and grief. He never did understand. I hope he never does understand. Grief is an awful thing, in the same way that war is an awful thing. And we who have not gone to war need to understand that we never will understand. But we need to remember that there are those who do, all too well.
We need to remember that war is awful, and is to be avoided. We need to understand that we do not understand the experience of those who went, and we need to be grateful and thankful for their service.
We need Remembrance Day.
