Remember your dead. Remember your fallen heroes.

You already know, from glancing at the color of my flag, that our ideologies clash.

You remember smiling fathers, who had marched off to liberate distant lands, never to return.

You remember brothers, uncles, sons, who fought and fell in an effort to preserve your possessions, your freedom and your way of life.

That is as it should be. Someone must remember.

On this day, I remember also.

I remember the hoarse-throated cries for equality, silenced by the finality of the rifle’s crack. I remember the wailing of hungry children, blanketed forever beneath the baleful thunder of the falling bombs. I remember those whose fierce courage allowed them to stand in the face of insurmountable odds and demand change.

I remember the forgotten children of every failed revolution; every miserable struggle for freedom that ever rose to fruition on the crest of passion and the demand to be treated as men rather than chattel or slaves. I remember, too, that armies exist to quell such distasteful spectacles, and whether just or vile, silence and sorrow cover the land like a shroud wherever they pass.

And, that is as it should be also. Someone must remember.

But, whichever side of the line you find yourself standing on, remember this also:

Of nations, causes, and distant lands whose people and plights come to you only as rumor, divorce yourselves. There is a long line of men who have stood, fought, loved, suffered, and fallen so that you might be here today. Their line stretches out behind you to the most distant horizon, and every passion they carried existed so that you might, one day, live and come to realize your potential.

I do not speak of your potential as soldiers, bankers, doctors, lawyers, or anything else that bears the title of a profession or pass-time. I speak of your potential as human beings. Define it as you will, deep within you, I know you grasp the heart of it.

Remember those that have gone before. Remember yourself, and strive, somehow, to be worthy of it all. That, alone, will ever be enough to justify the fallen.

Love.

Redguard@blackvault.com