Veteran's Day

[filkertom]

Thursday is Veteran's Day, and beldar informs us of some nice deals various businesses are giving in support of the troops. I presume you have to prove you're a veteran to take advantage of these.

Those of you who read this LJ who are veterans, I and everyone else here thanks you for your service to your country. Doesn't matter which country -- you served. Thank you.

Those of you who wish to celebrate veterans you know, feel free to do so in comments.

Comments

[beldar.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the shoutout -- for most you do have to offer some proof, so I have extra copies of my "DD 214" military discharge form.

I did my Army hitch back in the 80s, a generation or so earlier my Dad was overseas with the Army, also in southern Germany.

I recommend reading "War" by Sebastian Junger to get a real sense of what today's serviceperson is going through. We can't honor them enough.

[unclelumpy.livejournal.com]

Good wishes to our brave fighting men and women on this day of rememberance.

May this nation one day remember the difference between supporting and exploiting.

[gridlore.livejournal.com]

How about Drum Major Jack Berry of the Devonshire Regiment of Foot. Veteran of the Crown's service in India and in the Second Boer War. In South Africa, he saw action at Elandslaagte (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Elandslaagte) and the Siege of Ladysmith (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Ladysmith). He returned home, retired from the service and died at a fairly young age. But not before fathering several children, one of whom rose to the rank of Colonel and was the British liaison to the US 3rd Army during Patton's drive through Europe. One of his sons moved to the US and had three kids, the middle one who became an Airborne Ranger.

And is posting here today.

So, here's to you Great-Grandfather, and Grandfather, and Dad, and everyone else in my family history (and there are a lot of them, family legend has one ancestor blowing up a bakery in frustration when he heard that Napoleon had been captured.) who wore the uniform.

[shockwave77598.livejournal.com]

I thank you squire. But I just wish so many had been so caring when I or my father came back from overseas.

[spotshouse.livejournal.com]

My service was primarily spent helping Vietnamese refugees settle in the U.S. It's easy for us to forget just how comfortable we are until we meet someone who literally has only the clothes on their backs. About a year ago, a Vietnamese woman about my age came into my library with a younger woman. She kept glancing at me and finally walked up and asked if I was in the Army. I told her yes and she said she was one of the people I had processed into this country. It was incredible. I was choked up and so was she. She remembered me after 36 years! I was touched and amazed.

[bayushisan.livejournal.com]

My Dad was in the army and all of my uncles served in different branches of the Armed Services. I also had a teacher at Schoolcraft College that helped to liberate one of the concentration camps during World War 2. I have nothing but admiration and respect for those who choose to serve their country and I thank them all for that service.

[starmalachite.livejournal.com]

My eldest uncle served in Germany in the early 1950s -- speaking Pennsylvania Dutch got him sent there instead of Korea. Except for that, nobody in my family has served since WWI. My parents' generation were all too young for Korea & too old for Viet Nam. My grandparents' generation were all farmers, steelworkers, or railroadmen, & those who tried to sign up for WWII were firmly told to stay where they were.

So military service is kind of a vast Unknown to me, but that only increases my immense respect for those who have served.

(OTOH, genealogy has established that both my parents had ancestors in the Revolution. Remember hearing in elementary school about the German-speaking farmboy recruits the anglophone officer corps couldn't communicate with until Baron von Steuben showed up? My kinfolks.)

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

My dad was a physician in the Army until he retired after 20, his father was a Naval aviator in WWII and Korea, my little brother was a Marine for 6 years, one brother-in-law served in the Marines and another in the Army, my nephew's in the Coast Guard, and one of my younger sisters was in Army ROTC. Plus some relatives on my wife's side in the Air Force and Army.

(I found out when I was fairly young that my eyesight would forever bar me from military service. Given my general attitude towards authority, this may have been for the best all around, but it took me a while to get used to it.)

I thank them all for their service.

[lizziecrowe.livejournal.com]

My grandfather was one of the guys who made it through Iwo Jima. He's not in the statue everyone has seen, but he is in the picture that was taken of the remaining Marines. He died 5 years ago, but he remains to this day one of the funniest, sweetest, most honorable men I have ever known. Here's to you, Papaw.

[rivkaesque.livejournal.com]

My grandfather was a veteran who served in WWII as a young man. He was one of very few men with no religion on his dog-tags - as Jew fighting Nazis, he didn't want that information out there.
Thank you, Grandad, for all you did.

My grandmother volunteered for the army when they were first accepting women for WWII. Though she never saw combat and is not technically a veteran due to the odd way they handled females in the army during that time, I feel she deserves my thanks as well. I wish I had had a chance to know her.

And last but definitely not least, my heartfelt thanks to all the veterans I have known outside my family throughout my life and my prayers and good wishes to our service people currently in danger. I especially honor Amy, a ROTC student at a Boston-area university during my time at Boston U, who is currently serving overseas. Come back safe, Amy.

[markbernstein.livejournal.com]

My father enlisted in April of 1941, and was discharged in November of 1945.

I'm having dinner at Applebee's tonight with a group of friends, two of them veterans.

[birder2.livejournal.com]

I was never in the military, but my kid sister served in the Vietnam war. She was a physical therapist who wound up on Guam, processing all the 'Nam soldiers who needed p.therapy She also met a marine pilot--whom she married.

[dysprog.livejournal.com]

My grandfather (Rest in Peace) Served in the Marines in WWII and the Army in Korea. See, he finish his term in the Marines, and a bunch of friends talked him into joining the Army Reserve: "It's pretty much the same thing except only one weekend a month, and right here near home. And you get a little extra money for your new wife!". Then his Reserve unit was sent to Korea.

[darthparadox.livejournal.com]

My great-grandfather served in the Army a couple years after WWI. My grandfather served in Korea in 1947, as part of the US effort to get South Korea reestablished after Japan's surrender. My wife's grandfather was in the Canadian merchant marine during WWII, and both of her parents were in the Navy - her mother for a few years until she retired after marrying her father, who made a career of it before retiring sometime in the early 90s.

Thank you.