Sunday, May 27, 2001

Tiny flags are simple reminders of those who gave us so much

By Matt Markey
Outdoors Columnist

Several hundred tiny American flags gave a quick salute each time the breeze lifted their stars and stripes. With an almost military-like precision, the little swatches of red, white and blue were doing their part to honor those that made that flag, and everything it stands for, possible.

The cemeteries throughout the area were prepared for tomorrow's Memorial Day ceremonies a couple of days in advance. The tombstones of veterans were dressed with the small flags, and together they formed a blanket of bright color against the backdrop of gray granite. The sun cut in and out of the rolling banks of clouds, as if to spotlight those proud individuals who had been laid to rest with the harsh sound of a 21-gun salute, and the soft, eerie melody of taps.

In some form or another, they had all put their lives and their futures on the line. They weren't protecting their houses, their families or their modest lifestyle from the immediate threat of a foreign invader. No, most of them probably never had to shoulder a weapon, drop a live round into the chamber, and take aim at another human being.

But they were ready to do so, if that's what it took to make it safe for others. If that's what it took to make certain the American way of life was preserved, these individuals were ready to take the most severe actions necessary. That is what they had been trained to do.

Certainly, those who fought in the World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam all made the most noticeable gesture. Many came home with their eyes forever closed. Some never came home, their bodies lost somewhere in the chaos and mayhem of conflict. Their souls, however, are with the rest, and that is all that really matters.

Sometime this weekend, between all of the hamburgers cooking on the grill, the picnics in the rain, the Indy 500 and fishing at the lake, we need to remember the people who gave us those things. We have so many choices on Memorial Day, so much freedom to do as we please, because they felt it was worth fighting for.

There is not another place on this Earth where people have so many choices, so much freedom, so many rights. Know that those things were important to the founding fathers, but when we're doling out the credit for our right to vote, our right to speak out, and a thousand other rights we take for granted, think first of the men and women who left all of that behind and went far away to preserve it.

It would make a lot of sense for everyone who has had the chance to squirrel hunt on a crisp autumn day, or wade into the Sandusky River to match wits with a smallmouth bass, or stack a load of freshly cut firewood alongside the house, to take a stroll through the cemetery sometime this week. The names on the headstones wont mean much. The faces you will never have seen, but those tiny American flags will tell you that person gave you all of those things.

We owe the guy who slogged through the mud in Italy, the guy who withered down to nothing in the jungles of Asia, and the woman who patched up the D-Day wounded and spent so many nights in the bomb shelters of England. We owe the guy who choked and gagged on poison gas in the Argonne, and the guy who chased an enemy he couldn't see along the Ho Chi Minh Trails.

But we also owe a huge debt to the guy who mans the recruiting office, the woman who gives up a weekend a month to wear drab clothing and drive a Hummer to a mock battleground in the national forest, and to the guy who gets up a 5 every morning to take the train to an office near the Pentagon. We owe the guy on the coast guard cutter off the coast of Maine, the woman processing payments at the Veterans Administration, and the guy who feeds the crew on the nuclear submarine on a mission no one knows about.

We owe all of those people, and hundreds of thousands like them, who give us the best quality of life on the planet. We have what other people have never had, or ever dreamed of having.

They don't have a hunting season in Cuba and there are no sportsman's clubs in China. There are many places in the world where you can not own a hunting rifle, a shotgun, or a compound bow. In many other countries, all of the game and sport fish that remain belong to government officials or their wealthy cronies. Hunting and sport fishing just are not an option for the common man.

But there's a few hundred guys out in the graveyard who thought you should have the right to do those things. They thought it was important. They donned the uniform and sent a message to the rest of the world. They said no one should consider limiting those rights, unless they were up for a good, long fight. And no one has met that challenge.

The bitter irony that hits home on Memorial Day is this: while those brave Americans served and fought to protect what many of us love, they were also fighting for the very people who are constantly trying to chip away at those rights.

Some would spit or trample on those tiny flags, rather than salute or honor them. That has to hurt the men and women who wore the uniform and lie at rest in the cemetery. But they protected that right, just the same, and that is the ultimate in sacrifice and service to their country.

Matt Markey is the A-T outdoors columnist