On This Memorial Day…Feeling Small…Not Tall

ON THIS MEMORIAL DAY…
FEELING SMALL; NOT TALL…

Imagine being eighteen years old and three thousand miles away from your family. You’re aboard the USS Aircraft Carrier HORNET where you have just helped launch Col. Jimmy Doolittle’s Raiders on their way to bomb Toyko. The mission proves successful but your aircraft carrier is spotted by the Japanese, fired upon and begins rapidly filling with water. The order has now been given to abandon ship. You and your remaining shipmates hang on to whatever debris happens to float by until picked up by a hospital ship. That was my dad’s life during WW II. It makes me feel awful small to know that when I was eighteen my main concern was who was I going to take to the Drive-In-Theater on Saturday night. Let’s remember our fallen veterans not just today but each and every day; as they are the reason English is still our national language. I miss you dad…sj