On Monday, soldiers who fought in old conflicts and new will join supporters at Glenwood Centre, where they will pay their respects at 11 a.m. to comrades who fell and who continue to fall in modern wars.
Some will consider Monday to be the last day in a long weekend. Some will use the occasion to get out of town for a few days, others will do some chores and even begin putting Christmas decorations up as we are starting to see around town. If you don’t see Christmas themes on television then you hear them on the radio.
Christmas will be here soon enough. But here and now we shouldn’t forget that it is a time remember.
More and more we see people going about other things in their lives on Nov. 11, seemingly oblivious to what the day has meant for the past 70 years.
It’s time to remember soldiers who were brought home to be buried, and others whose graves dot far away landscapes.
It’s time to remember the parents of those who never came home. How would you like to have been parents whose son, with a whole life yet to be lived, has been killed in war and people aren’t even acknowledging Remembrance Day?
It’s time to remember soldiers who volunteered to fight in unpopular and misunderstood conflicts such as Vietnam and Korea who never came home to ticker tape parades.
It’s also a time to remember soldiers who came home but who continue to wage a war within as they cope with the debilitating effects of PTSD incurred as a result of war.
It’s not that we should go out of our way to remember on Nov. 11. On the contrary, we should never forget.
— Alberni Valley News