How do you remember?

Another gloomy Thursday but it suits best what this day really means to all people in the world. Last year, we managed to go out there despite the cold, windy, wet weather. We drove our way for an hour and a half to commemorate this day, among with other Canadians in Victoria, the Capital of BC. Click here for more photos of the event. Today, we might just watch the event on the projector that my honey had left standing, from last night's late movies and I'm pretty sure, he will tell me the story over and over again.....

I swear I never heard or seen war stories and movies in my life until I got married. The closest reality I could remember getting a grip to a military uniform was being a Captain of  Charlie Company way back when I was in High School. And the reason why I was chosen to handle 2 platoons of hard headed boys of the lowest grade was because (I think....) apparently, I had one of the loudest voices. Period. But I managed to handle those men despite my height and my frequent fainting sessions in the field of heat and wrapped green uniform from head to toe with a heavy pair of boots and sword on my right arm. I remember how I fought with the creamy white silver cleaner every time we held these parade of march battalion just to make that sword shining through the light enough to blind your eye if you were watching. That went on for two years....

Today, if I tell that story to anybody, I'd swear ( holy! I can swear!), all I could see is that look in my honey's dry sense of humour. But hey, guess what? Can do you a proper salute? Can you command a platoon with proper marching and make them behave like real men? Can you salute through a heavy sword or a wooden shotgun? ( I hear him laughing again...) Just a few of the things I learned from that experience.... I still fear the men in uniform esp those with real weapons hanging on their waists. But every time I hear my honey tell me stories about how those men fought the war; and how much he knows about "Normandy"; how his own dad became a Veteran, whom we owe our lives from, this military thing is becoming more and more real to me.

I swear I've seen more real footage with my honey than what I've watched on the tube when I was a little girl with grandpa taking control of the remote: Filipinos' reenactment of the Japanese invasion in the Philippines and stories of my grandma when they used to hide under war bunkers (or hide from some Japanese who were trying to pursue her); and that my mom was born 1944, a very significant war era till this very day. I'm sure many of you have their own war stories and today, of all days in 365 days of every year, WE DO REMEMBER. And my honey's story of his dad, in vehicles and warships with millions of military men, soldiers who fought and died for our rights and our freedoms that we enjoy today, that's how we would commemorate this day.



TEN-HUT!