I’ve written several pieces over the years about Memorial Day, a day of remembrance
of the men and women who have given their very lives to preserve the democracy
envisioned by our founding forefathers. Too
often we take this day for granted and I have a visceral abhorrence of making
this day one of “Memorial Day sales.”
Although my father did not die when he fought in WW II,
he reluctantly talked about buddies who did.
I cannot help but think of him on this day and Veterans Day, just an
average “Joe” who found himself in the maelstrom of the times, and did his best
transitioning from a civilian to becoming a member of the armed forces,
stationed in Europe until he returned home in 1945.
Those were different times from the shadow wars of terrorism
we live with today.. The entire nation
was drawn into the war. Hollywood films
of those years walked the fine line between propaganda and the literal
truth. I find myself drawn to them on
Turner Classic Movies this weekend, just to get a sense of what my father and
millions of men and women like him had to endure. And what it was like on the home front. I vaguely remember the days when my father
was gone. My great-grandmother would
take me in my stroller to Jamaica Avenue to buy groceries. There were no shopping malls,
mega-stores. Those were neighborhood
stores and everyone knew your name. My
mother lived with her parents and her grandmother, waiting for the safe return
of my father. I don’t remember that day,
but somehow I felt his absence.
I’ve taken many photographs of our flag over the years,
having a 25 foot high flagpole in our own courtyard. After 20 years the pulley wheel on top froze
and I was no longer able to raise our flag.
The flagpole is too high for a ladder and I had to bring in a bucket
truck to replace the pulley, this time with a revolving one so the flag can
move more easily with the wind. Coincidentally
only days after repairing the flag pole there was a full moon. I took this photograph, hoping to post it
today.
One of the movies made during the war was a 10 minute
short, “The House I Live In” staring
Frank Sinatra in which he sings the song of the same title. It encapsulates those times and it is not a
song one hears very often. I made a home
piano recording of it trying out a new recording device, the TASCAM DR-05, a
step up from the one I’ve used before, but complicated to use. Therefore, it is a work in progress. Nonetheless I post it here, and the words to
the song follow.
Let us remember.
What is America to
me?
A name, a map, or
a flag I see?
A certain word,
"democracy"?
What is America to
me?
The house I live
in, a plot of earth, a street
The grocer and the
butcher, and the people that I meet
The children in
the playground, the faces that I see
All races and
religions, that's America to me
The place I work
in, the worker by my side
The little town or
city where my people lived and died
The
"howdy" and the handshake, the air of feeling free
And the right to
speak my mind out, that's America to me
The things I see
about me, the big things and the small
The little corner
newsstand and the house a mile tall
The wedding in the
churchyard, the laughter and the tears
The dream that's
been a-growin' for a hundred and fifty years
The town I live
in, the street, the house, the room
The pavement of
the city, or a garden all in bloom
The church, the
school, the clubhouse, the millions lights I see
But especially the
people
That's America to
me
