Memorial Day

Memorial Day, it is a time for reflection. I am a cub scout leader and I have tried to teach the boys how important it is to honor our flag and what it stands for. We have learned how to treat it, take care of it, display it and fold it. The boys are very lucky to get invited every year to help the American Legion in the Memorial Day Flag Ceremony at the grave of the unknown soldier. This year I took my son and three of his friends to help the American Legion post flags at the graves of soldiers. They followed along in the cemetery as the men explained to them how they were walking through history. They showed the boys what markers to look for and to not just place the flag but to read the stones so they would know what rank the soldiers had and the war, if any, they served in. When one of the boys placed a flag on a grave of a soldier that served in the Civil War they realized that it wasn't just a story from their history books. That it now was a part of their own personal history. This had them all searching for markers and they even found some that the men had missed. I was very proud of the respect they showed that day. I know that it is one thing to be there with the kids as they do these things and another to wonder if it is reaching them. Well it is. I was doing a craft fair around a year ago at a church with a cemetery. My children and the children of a good friend were outside playing in the church yard. I saw them in the cemetery and I didn't feel it was appropriate for them to be playing in it and told them to stay out. Later I was told they were not playing in it as I had thought. The two youngest boys were finding the graves of soldiers, saluting and say the Pledge of Allegiance. It brought me to tears. A mother and a scout leader couldn't be prouder! Sometimes we should follow in their footsteps!