How Is It Possible To Honor Such People?

Today's title was a line from the keynote address at this year's Memorial Day ceremony at Rosehill Cemetery. Lieutenant General Jerry Sinn (ret.) said it as he was referring to his drive to work in Alexandria, Virginia and encountering memorials recognizing all of America's fallen soldiers from the Revolutionary War to the present day. And that stuck ... sticks with me. For though I didn't serve in the military myself, my father did, his fathers did, two of my brothers did (and one of them still does) and I'm sorry to say I'm a little ashamed of myself for that. I don't think I was that afraid to die.


But I digress.


We'd come off our weekend distinguished for us with a 28-year-old tree (we learned this after we counted the tree rings) being pushed down by the rain and wind through our backyard Saturday afternoon. The tree had been dead since the flood six years ago and it wouldn't take much to fell it. Our nephew Patrick and his firend Donovan with the chainsaw cut up the tree, the family and I gathered the sticks and branches, and while I was gone yesterday at the ceremony and a chili luncheon held by the local VFW post afterward with Robert my father-in-law and Mary my sister-in-law Martha, Sarah, and Jeffrey cut and cleaned the lawn, and I am much relieved at that!


Yesterday at the kids' urging we started playing Monopoly!


Which is possibly my favorite board game, but few in the household ever want to play it with me. I especially love where we've got it set up right now, on our dining room table where we haven't actually dined -- Martha, Sarah, Jeffrey, and I, that is -- in years. Unless we're eating out, the only time we're eating sitting in the same room is in our living room watching or doing something because the dining room table usually has some thing or things we haven't bothered moving! So we started a Monopoly game (Jeffrey got a 2003 version for Christmas last year) where at first we couldn't find the property cards because they were the same size as Chance and Community Chest an hour before Martha had to go to Burger King from five to nine last night, stopped the game,


played another two hours after Martha got home,


and now it's sitting on the table waiting for us to get started tonight after Martha's home from Burger King last night. Sunday of course was spent in church with me getting called to read the lesson, our high school graduates were honored, and when we left we took some passes we'd won to Jack Hoeven Wee Links Golf Course and played nine holes. These aren't your standard length nine holes -- they range from 70 to 116 yards -- but neither are they miniature golf holes where you have to putt the ball through a wall or into a hole to have it pop out the other side. And Martha was sure we'd have had our swings and stances criticized by any professionals if they were there!


Good way to kill a few hours.


It's hard for me to keep these posts lighthearted as well as entertaining and informative since I'm thinking about where I'll be gainfully employed in the next month or so -- the office where I work is closing in four and a half weeks. I can understand not hearing something good regarding my two interviews last week before Memorial Day, so while I may have the right to be anxious, I'm not going to be. I have one life and it's short enough. Why waste it on things I don't want?


David