A year ago this week my parents came up to watch as their only grandson graduate from college. The day threatened rain, but we sat for hours in the stands of the football stadium, waiting for the graduates to appear. We applauded them all, heard a speech from Harry Truman's grandson, took some photos, cleaned the last of my son's things out of his dorm room, and headed home. Along the way, we stopped at a little diner in Hannibal, MO. At the counter I bought a coffee mug. It's blue, and like everything in Hannibal it has a picture of Mark Twain on the side. There was no particular reason I bought the mug; it was just a small indulgence on a good day. After that we drove back to St. Louis and my parents made the longer haul to their home in Kentucky.
It was the last supper I would ever share with my dad. I've been washing and reusing that coffee mug every day since. Coincidences of time and place turn the trivial into cherished treasures.
This week, after waiting a year, I finally got around to changing the registration on one of the vehicles from my father's name to mine. In the process that meant a change in another everyday item that had acquired meaning that might seem out of proportion to it's place. I took off his license plate. It wasn't a vanity plate with a clever phrase. It was just an ordinary plate, except for one thing: at the top it reads "Veteran."
My father was not a military man. I'm not going to go into his Army adventures (and misadventures) because I already did so last year on the day after his death. He didn't go to a service academy. He didn't have a military career. He served his one hitch, he came home. There were no great heroics. He never faced enemy fire. For anyone keeping score, it would have looked like a small slice out of his life.
But those years were extremely important to him. They bound him to other men and women in uniform in a way I'll never experience. They made him acutely aware that the sacrifices those in the service make start long before they arrive on the front lines. If he could have talked to those young soldiers who came to fold the flag from his funeral, and who stayed to share a meal after the ceremony, he would have thanked them. No one had any doubt that he would have wanted them there.
Those few years were pivotal in his life not because of what he was taught in marksmanship class or how he learned to make a bed (though the man could fold a mean hospital corner). That time in the service enlarged his world, both physically and mentally. When he came back home, he never forgot that others were still out there. He took off his Army uniform, but he never shed the ideals. He was out of the service, but he didn't cease to serve.
Ideals are not the exclusive domain of the military. "Freedom isn't Free," as a bumper sticker slogan, is all too often used as a wedge between those who support a particular military action and those who oppose it. But that slogan can as easily be applied to those of us not in uniform. America's servicemen and women have a special responsibility, but that doesn't absolve the rest of us of our responsibility. Part of that responsibility it to recognize the nature of their service by seeing that veterans get the best equipment, protection, and leadership possible when they're in the service. It's taking care of their families both while they're away, and while they're trying to adapt when they return home. It's also making sure that they get the medical attention, training, and job opportunities they deserve when they complete their time in uniform.
Our responsibility is seeing that America remains a place where freedom is not dependent on the money in your bank account, your family connections, the gun in your pocket, or the largess of political leaders. A place where diversity of opinion is not a problem, but a strength. A place worthy of the devotion those in the military have shown.
This day is reserved for honoring those who have served in the military, and that should not be forgotten. Every day is a day for honoring our obligation to both them and to everyone else. Not only is freedom not free, freedom can not be won on a battlefield. All the soldiers who have died in every war from the Revolutionary War to date have not, and can not, secure our liberty. They can only see that we have the opportunity to win it, or lose it, every day, through the actions we take right here at home.