Remembrance day

[terriko]

As many of you know, I have very mixed feelings about remembrance day.

During the second world war, one side of my family was off fighting, trying to lie about their ages as they attempted to defend their country. Dying.

The other side of my family was tossed into concentration camps as enemy aliens in the country where many of them were born. Including my father, only a few years old.

So I listened to the remembrance day ceremonies on the radio this morning. And I thought about the peace we have here, and the costs we've incurred to get it.

There's a lot to remember. Lest we forget.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Nice to read this. I have similar feelings.

My father and his family fled to Canada from Hungary in the early 50s. The family was rich, which was dangerous considering the communist revolution in the works. The family also had Jewish blood, dangerous for different reasons. My mother's father was a pilot in the Canadian army -- he never said how involved he was.

But I mostly don't think about them, but all the young people killing on all the sides, killing each other on the orders of the safer, older people who decided their deaths were necessary.

As you say, there's a lot to remember, and it's hard to know what those little red flowers are supposed to make us think about it. I sure don't like that poem, about the dead prodding on the living to "take up the quarrel with the foe."

Zoli