As Good a History Lesson as Any



I asked students in a college level American history class one day why we celebrated Memorial Day; the answers ranged from the sublime to the absurd (and BTW: only 7 out of 23 students hit the nail on the head); here are three of the most truly memorable answers:

This is when we gather to celebrate our lost and misplaced memories.

Memmurial day detonates but once a yere and then we visit semetaries. (And yes, the spelling was his.)

This holiday helps us bring dead soldiers back to life to honor what killed them.

As far as I know, not one of those kids happened to be clinically brain dead.

Anyway, WHY do we celebrate this day and when did we begin to celebrate it?

Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day and conceived of as a national day of remembrance to honor those who died in the Civil War, then more generally to honor any of those who died or served in our nation's wars.  

Eventually, the holiday has grown to more broadly honor all those who have served their country outside of the military, such as police and firefighters. I know many people who take it further and use it as an occasion to honor all of the people who’ve died in their own families, whether they were vets or civil servants or just a beloved grandmother.

I’m of the opinion that it’s a fine thing indeed to reflect on those who went before us to build this nation, whether they died in the line of service or not, so honoring grandma doesn’t bother me a bit, although I know it bugs the purists.

I figure if you’ve spent a lifetime in this country you’ve paid your dues so “thank you.” If you’ve loved America, I honor you. It’s not a perfect place but it’s probably a damn sight better than most.

Of course, there are probably quite a few people who believe Memorial Day commemorates race car driving. Seriously. One of my students also wrote this:

Memorial Day is a day set apart each year to recognize the contribution the automobile has made to history especially in Indianapolis, especially in May, when it happens each year.

(No, that student’s last name is not Palin but he did have a terrifying interest in politics; right wing of course.)

But let's get serious.

As I was doing a little research for this blog I stumbled upon a few semi-interesting and completely irrelevant facts:

First, many historians believe freed Norwegians living in Charleston, South Carolina at the end of the Civil War founded Memorial Day at the graveyard of 158 Viking soldiers who fought for Confederate General Beauregard Lars Svenson.

That first fact gets us to the second: over a dozen American cities and towns contest the first fact, claiming their location and citizens gave birth to this national tradition. Apparently President Lyndon Baines Johnson decided to choose a side on the issue because in May 1966 he declared that Memorial Day’s official birthplace is Beaverbutt, Wyoming. I have no idea why LBJ did that but knowing the wily old horse trader I suspect he owed Wyoming’s only Congressman big time -- and for some weird reason (maybe before Congressmen made their real livings collecting personal welfare payments from oil companies) – such an absurdly small payoff seemed reasonable.  It could also be because Beaverbutt was founded by the descendants of the famous British Indian Warrior Wellington who defeated Napoleon using bullets wrapped in Norwegian lutefisk and herring oil -- or maybe it’s just because its home to the world’s largest inland fjord. (This is absolutely true.)

Here's the famous Lord Percy-Smythe Wellington when he rode with Wild Bill Hickock:

No, wait, maybe this is  him here:

  

Oh hell, they look so damn much alike I can't tell and what does it matter, right?

The point is that Johnson respected history as much as the next man which really means until the truth didn’t suit his purposes anymore. But don’t get me wrong; I don’t hold it against the guy. In this day and age of gross exaggeration, total fabrication and even obvious mental illness among politicians and pundits I think ol’ LBJ was, in comparison, the American Socrates of Truth and a virtual paragon of virtue.

In fact, as I used to tell my students, I suspect LBJ might even have felt guilty about selling out those Norwegians in Charleston. Therefore, he decided to create something called The Great Society which was really a socialist plot to turn America into another Southeast Asia so he could sell American dominoes over there and, it’s as clear as the nose on my face and the porch I’m standing on right here in this Great State where Lincoln made it possible for Ronald Reagan to be born in a log cabin (bless his heart), this is why black people, who have been told lies by liberal Democrats, are totally responsible for the creation of the Domino Theory to rob good, hard working, God fearing Americans of their right to sing the national anthem at the Indy 500.

We’re going to take back this country and all of our dominoes so that never again will decent patriotic Americans have to worry about Planned Parenthood denying any little girls their God-given right to their own virginity. 

And this is exactly why, my friends, we celebrate Memorial Day.

OK, so I make one sorry-ass historian but by God you gotta’ know I’d make one helluva good politician.

My Apologies & So Much More

SOME SATURDAY RAMBLINGS...
It's come to my attention that many of my friends who "follow" this blog have the blog posts sent to their email. Curiously, I'm not sure who they are unless they contact me via email or post a comment here because sometime last week my "Followers" (the widget where someone can see who "Follows" me and then opt in)  became corrupted and now all of the nice faces or gravatars that appeared on the blog have gone "POOF!" and are no longer displayed.

In their place is a large gaping blank space and try as I might I can't seem to solve the problem.

Of course, blog servers like EBlogger and WordPress operate in an alternate reality from the rest of us. It is impossible to speak to a human geek and so I've been forced to crawl through the mud of a quarter million "Help" forums to ferret out one that might provide some help. I've found many but most are now closed (yeah: closed) -- in other words, taking no more questions and dispensing no more help... or hope. I found one forum that was still open for business and emailed my problem... and that was last Wednesday.

The Drackmoid Geeks whom I believe control such things (yes, there is a planet known as Drackmoidia) might take a very long time to respond. When it comes to responding to a problem, they operate with all the speed of the snail mail they so thoroughly detest. They're nasty little SOB's but they control all the blog servers in the universe so there's not much I can do about it.
In fact, here's the ugly little bastard in charge of all blogs coming out of Chicago. You tell me how helpful you think he's gonna' be... yeah, right.

Of course, there are no long distance phone plans between Illinois, USA, Planet Earth and Drackmoidia, in the 5th galaxy beyond Andromeda, so they can't call me and if they did it probably wouldn't solve the problem because despite my fluency in 215 languages I have no competency in Drackgeekolese... to my ever personal mortification. But I never said I was perfect.

So, anyway, the bottom line is that I have no idea when you'll see the "Follow this Blog" widget appear again but one of my dear friends and fellow blogger, Kathleen Valentine, has told me that this same problem has happened on her blog and the widget reappeared as readily as it disappeared.

Interesting. I guess we need to take a wait & see attitude. BTW: ---> this is beautiful Kathleen. She writes books and knits shawls by the seashore and cooks comforting foods to nurture and heal.

This all said, I now apologize to anyone who's felt inundated with a plethora of emailed blog notices. I didn't realize that some people received my blog posts delivered to their email. Don't ask me how the hell I didn't know this (you'd be surprised the things that have eluded my notice over the years) but honestly I had no idea. Truthfully, I guess I just never thought about it.

I've developed a very bad habit which is that as I'm drafting an article for this blog I tend to "publish" it in order to look at it and proof it (because sometimes, among my other techno problems, "Preview" doesn't work). Well, I bet I was in & out of my last several posts more than a dozen times -- "publishing" over and over again... consequently generating a constant stream of posts to email.

Therefore, you may have felt spammed and I apologize. I'm sure it was very annoying and I'm so sorry; I promise to not build my posts that way again! I want to thank my other dear friend, Nicole Daines Gibeaut, who brought this to my attention. Thank God she did! She also promised to send me some vibes to relax me and comfort me.

<----And this is beautiful Nicole! She writes books and paints beautiful pictures at a different sea shore... and she's also an ordained minister and spiritual healer and, like Kathleen, mentors and comforts me much.

I'm somewhere in the middle, right about here ---->
(No one knows what the hell I do and most of the time neither do I.)

Blogging is a new adventure for me and a very different style of writing than what I've been trained to do but I like it, it's fun, and I'm learning a great deal about my ability to write in a variety of ways. It's been a definite growth experience for me. The tekky Drackgeekie part, however, is... uh.... well, OK, I'll just say it: a total pain in the ass.

But with friends like all of you I know somehow we'll get through it together and even have a few damn good laughs. And one of those friends, Cindy Newlin O'Connor, who's one of my oldest friends, wrote me the most remarkable letter of support and friendship last night... she wrote to tell me how much she loves my blogging and watching me "blossom" as the writer she knows I was always meant to be... Cindy is a creative loving force of nature with many talents, including photography. Her moonscape is on the cover of "January Moon."

Whatever you choose to do over this long Memorial Day weekend I sincerely hope you remain safe, enjoy, and maybe even take a little time out to remember who and what this national holiday is all about. Such things are indeed important. This really is a holiday to pause and give thanks. It's one thing to thank God for a turkey but totally another to thank Her for those brave souls who have died in the service of this country. We thank them by remembering.

And Del Carter and Fred Wiley said that since the last two posts have been about them and the music they love that I should mention also that the real music that belongs to Memorial Day is "Taps."


Del, Wiley and I are working on an article now about Memorial Day (up tomorrow) but in the meantime here's a wonderful YouTube video; just click on the link:   Arlington National Cemetery (Amazing Grace & TAPS)

And you're not giong to believe it but just as I was going to publish this blog I saw that my Followers widget is back!! Did the Drackmoid Geeks solve the problem or did the widget just reappear as Kathleen predicted? Or was it the vibes Nicole sent my way? Cindy mentioned she keeps me in her prayers; did they help?

Maybe it was a small gift after I listened to my favorite song in the world, "Amazing Grace," and meditated on my many blessings and how totally trivial my problems truly are, and then whispered a little prayer for the men and women in service today... maybe that's why I was given a small gift. Maybe it's all of it; everything combined.

Of course, I don't deserve the gift; complaining about a blog is trivial in extremis -- preposterous, ridiculous, idiotic.

But you know what? It's all how you look at it and I'll take this little blog miracle graciously because I've learned that anything that keeps us grateful and humbled is a very good thing and can be the Perfect Instant Attitude Adjuster.

Everything can be a lesson, most especially one's own craven foolishness.

Peace; ~mick