I do not know what to make of Memorial Day, a day where the media’s messages are about store sales, miles driven, and gas prices that consumers—not citizens, but consumers—will face as they fill up on the way out of town.
I do not know what to make of a day we view as a day for vacations and barbecues, instead of taking time out to remember and honor those who served, especially those who died in combat, defending our freedom.
I find it confusing because some who died fought a war I protested.
I joined the protests in San Francisco because my nephew Mike, our family's flesh and blood, would be sent to fight as an infantryman, and would bear the brunt of the death, both inflicted and suffered, caused by this war.
I marched because, along with millions of others, I did not believe we were being told the entire truth of the reasons for war, that Mike and his buddies were being sent in harm's way for less-than-honorable reasons. It angered me. It doesn't make me feel better that it turns out that indeed not only the lives of human beings were sacrificed in this struggle.