Memorial Day, 2007

A thank you to the men and women who died in military service to foster and protect the place where I was born.



I am fortunate to hold a passport that grants me the privilege of living and working abroad.

I am proud to be from a country that allows, even encourages, its citizens to do so.

I am reminded of a particular quote from JFK, originally from Luke 12:48.

"Of those to whom much is given, much is required."

--

I pass a particular graveyard several times a week here in Swaziland. It looks nothing like the one above. It has clumsy stacks of brown rocks marking the crowded graves, and the plot is awkwardly placed on a hillside with little vegetation, so that the loose red dirt, when it rains, runs downhill toward the primary school in the valley.

It is a earth-toned place. There is no green there. No flags.

I watched from a distance as they unceremoniously buried a young man there a few months back.