We Must Not Forget

Published in the Tri-Cities Herald. Feb.17, 1991 during the Gulf War, as a

"Special to the Editor"

It was 1943 in a small Ohio town. The parsonage where my family lived was a two-story, white-framed house, sitting near the kind of sidewalk that invited "Step on a crack, you'll break your Mother's back" and lazy games of hop-scotch on a summer's day.

It was the kind of neighborhood where giant fruit trees stretched their arms for us to climb, wide front porches with trellises of morning glories shaded squeaking metal gliders, and broad streets beckoned us kids to "kick the can" until dusk made it impossible to retrieve it.

It also was the kind of neighborhood that mysteriously shrank its trees, cramped its porches, reduced its tall structures and narrowed its streets by the time of my nostalgic revisiting, 20 years later.

June 1943 is indelible in my memory though I was only 6 years old then. A large American flag at the end of a thin, tan pole waved proudly from the metal holder attached to the front porch post; a red, white, and blue service flag, recently hung, graced our living room window; and my big brother's upstairs bedroom sat quiet and empty.

I have only flashes of memories from those months that followed:

Taking money to my first-grade class to purchase stamps that I licked and pasted into a stamp-book until it became fat enough to buy a Victory Bond.

Planting lettuce, radishes, peas and onions and then tending our Victory Garden with care.

Mom's saving rationing stamps for sugar and learning to cook and can with substitutes.

Taking our annual family vacation by Greyhound, rather than the family car, to save gasoline.

Wondering how my carefully penned letters could be delivered to the Destroyer Escort on which Roy had now taken residence, and being assured that my simple words of love and prayers for his safety would get to him somehow.

Taking pictures of my handsome sailor brother, during his furlough and recalling his surpirse at his little sis' newly acquired worldly knowledge of such things as "hubba hubba" and "Kiss Me Once, Kiss Me Twice, and Kiss Me Once Again. It's Been a Long Long Time."

Fitting his picture into my rose-gold, heart-shaped locket, and promising to keep it there until he came home again.

Participating in the drama that the preacher's family enacted on a Sunday evening to honor those in the service of our country. Our family sitting on the platform, around a large, round dining room table just as we did each evening in the parsonage, with our one noticeably empty chair. After the meal, each taking our turn in saying a prayer which included items of thanksgiving, always naming each of the others in our family circle, and now ending with special petitions for the safe return of our big brother, so far away from home. Except for the presence of the audience, it was much like any other evening in the white framed parsonage. We harmonized as we sang a chorus that my Dad had written, "My Home and Your Home, God's Home Shall Be." There were prayers for all our servicemen and women. Then sometime later in the evening, the congregation sang " God Bless America."

Granted, being in a preacher's home made my family unique, but the feelings, fears, hopes, and prayers were not unlike those of many families in our country today who have loved ones in the service. These men and women are not just numbers, nor are they only statistics. They are our brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, lovers, husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, friends.

Theirs are the empty chairs around our tables.

May we keep them in our hearts until they come home again.