Meaning

  It being memorial day my thoughts just naturally turn to the solemn occasion we are told to celebrate. It is becoming a bit more disturbing every year, I suppose as I approach my final Monday. You know, it wasn't always on a Monday, the date actually chosen was May 30th. It was chosen because there were no battles fought on that date during the civil war. And yes, it was called decoration day. A day to decorate the graves of the fallen, not a day to receive decorations for valor or any military service. It also didn't have anything to do with the start of summer. It is simply that the end of May brings warmer weather and many schools take a break. I guess global warming reenforced this perception of the unofficial beginning of summer. 

  For me Memorial day was always about a grand parade and poppies. I don't recall it being about the start of summer. My father was a veteran of WW2 but didn't belong to any veterans organizations and so wasn't involved in the parade. I knew many of those men that did however, teachers, Uncles, and family friends. I remember seeing them in their uniforms marching in formation the flag held high. I listened to the cadence being called and watched the feet of those men moving in unison. It was a military parade, as best as could be managed in small town America. There were others involved, the fire trucks, the high school marching band and even kids on their decorated bicycles, bringing up the rear. 

  How well I remember my mom giving that man a dollar for a poppy. A dollar was a sizable amount for that small cloth poppy back in the 1960's. It was explained that the money went to support those veterans that had made it home, injured and needing some help. A dollar was a very small price indeed when you think about it is what I was told. Mom would pin that poppy to her blouse and wear it all day. Afterward it usually wound up hanging for the rear view mirror in the car. Sometime over the course of the year it would disappear. Today I don't see many poppies being sold, many being displayed at all. I'm assuming it is simply because we have no veterans group around Greensboro and no parade. I think I did see one veterans selling them outside the Walmart one year. 

  I was read the poem In Flanders Field and told the significance of that. My parents had the old newspapers that listed those lost in the war, the war being WW2 at that time. Occasionally those names would be mentioned and it was generally a sad occasion when they were. No one was celebrating that. It was decoration day until 1967 when the name was changed to Memorial day. It was an expansion of the meaning of that day. Originally decoration day was established to honor those Union soldiers that were killed in combat. Over time and as healing took place it was expanded to include the confederate soldiers and WW1 soldiers and airmen. By 1967 it was recognized as a memorial to all those lost in all wars. In 1971 it was included in the Uniform Holiday Act, moving it to the final Monday in May to facilitate a three day weekend. 

                                                            In Flanders Fields

By John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

    That mark our place; and in the sky

    The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

    Loved and were loved, and now we lie,

        In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

    The torch; be yours to hold it high.

    If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

        In Flanders fields.  

                         Lest we forget.