Heroes Among Us

So another Memorial Day has come and gone, receding with the sunset and not to reappear until another year has passed.  Just as we carelessly throw around the term “veteran” in our everyday speech to describe

all manner of things completely unrelated to true veterans, for many of us Memorial Day, too, has lost much of its meaning.  With all the holiday sales on clothing, electronics and grilling equipment, along with the backyard barbecues and treks to the beach, it is all too easy to forget the true import of this day.  But I was reminded  recently as I watched the HBO miniseries “Band of Brothers”, which was being re-broadcast on cable television.

I had seen this miniseries before, but it bears re-watching for many reasons.  Perhaps more than anything, what leaves a mark is the unflinching depiction of the true horrors of war (at least, as true as they can ever be to someone who has never been there) and the honest portrayal of those ordinary individuals who fought in World War II, a study in heroism that included pain and anger and misery and, yes, fear.  And it's the fear that makes the sacrifice all the more poignant.  It was Mark Twain who said that “[c]ourage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear—not absence of fear.”  I believe that wholeheartedly, as there can be no greater bravery than that which trumps the fear of one's fate.

Also striking is the realization that following incredible acts of heroism and bravery in the midst of unimagineable horror, those who survived returned to live the anonymous and typical lives of mid- and late-century Americans.  They were men whose once-ordinary lives had been interrupted by the extraordinary circumstances of history, only to return to their ordinary lives when history had been made.  They became businessmen and mill workers and landscapers and teachers whose resumes were surely humble but whose accomplishments were surely not.  And aside from the fact that it's hard to imagine that they could ever have had the same perspective on life's minor annoyances as those who did not share their experiences, they could have been any one of us.  And I think that's the point.

As a society, we yearn for heroes, often bestowing such misplaced epithets on sports stars, cartoon “superheroes” and even celebrities.   But I would submit that we need look no further than our brave veterans whose contributions we honor on Memorial Day.  We rightfully admire the heroism of Eisenhower and Churchill and FDR, without whose leadership in the darkest days of recent history we are left to ponder what fate may have befallen the world.  But what of the everyday lives that were lost or forever changed on our behalf, both long ago and in the recent past?  And what of the brave men and women that continue to fight on our behalf  half-way across the globe?

I find myself wondering how we could ever possibly thank these people for their sacrifice.  As Winston Churchill famously said, "Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few".   Churchill was specifically referring to the valor shown by the Royal Air Force during the Battle of Britain in 1940, but his words have broader meaning, resonating through time and space.  I wonder how many of us ever really take those words to heart and contemplate their truth?

We can, and will, continue to debate the merits and necessity of war as the years go by.  We will continue to question what it is that ails the human heart, making such conflict a seeming inevitability.  But what cannot be debated is the debt of gratitude that we all owe to all of our veterans, these heroes among us.



Photo credit: 
Arlington National Cemetery.  Photo used by permission and license of the U.S. Army.