Remembrance Day, 2020

I got that Nov. 11 was a serious day when I was in grade 3. It was so still for those minutes. Even at a school assembly of kids. In those times – the 1950s – many had dads who had been in WWII. Maybe, that was why we fell so quiet.

But in any case, I knew that this was serious. I’ve obsessed over it for 60+ years.

Some say there is no way to spare future generations from this horror. I just can’t believe that. So I write. I think I see a way to end this madness, but it’s not likely to draw much attention in my lifetime. However, I can’t afford to think about that. The idea will be out there. For me, that is enough. 

We must make a curriculum for the world's schools that teaches all the children of our species to respect all of the other children of that species. Find your motive kids, to exhort yourself to be your personal best, by competing with yourself, not others.  Or at least, competing within the rules. There's always a referee in the ring or on the field. Obey that person's commands. Honor the ideals of the game. 

To those who think I am a Romantic aiming for solutions that will never be real, I say: “You haven’t considered the alternative”.

You see in every land in every era, war was always just a generation away, even for the lucky ones. War. A human constant in every society, every era.

What has changed is the level of destructiveness of our wars. That level keeps going up. WWIII? The next one that is all out? If we let it come, it will likely end us.

So? So we go back to re-considering my proposal. A peace curriculum for all students, spiraling upward in challenge level as the grades go up.

For today’s post, I’ll let that flat statement be enough.

But, I will say to friends who are veterans of real combat:

“I know you went through horror that I have not known and now never will. I had a weekend in 1969 during which I thought very hard about going down to Montana and joining the US Army. I’d bought the ‘Domino Theory’. Things my dad had said about the madness of war finally tilted me away from that choice. (Thanks, Pop.)

“But even though I know your worst mental images are not of things you saw but of things you did – by your own hands – I still like you. You were innocents. You went off to fight, maybe die, for ideals that turned out to be lies. But that willingness, so dedicated, that alone holds me in awe.

“It’s Remembrance Day. For those who saw and did the real thing, stand proud. Just your being there gives us all material for thought. Thank you for your service. Now let’s get to work on eradicating the roots of why you had to do that brutal job.”