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Veterans Day Perspective
Rocky Raab
Member Posts: 14,433 ✭✭✭✭
It was a duty and an honor to serve, but allow me this observation:
The federal government closes banks, schools, and the Post Office to honor Martin Luther King, but not for veterans. That's all you need to know about how the government values veterans.
I may be a bit crazy - but I didn't drive myself.
Comments
Checking, I learn that Post Office are closed today. I retract that part.
schools are closed here Rocky not sure if it is nationwide or just by states. took my granddaughter to shoneys this morning for breakfast the place was packed. she just looked around at all the old guys and told me later that a lot of them walk funny like you do papa. I told her that a lot of those older folks had volunteered to get on a boat or plane and leave their families to go to some other country, then they had to walk around the woods or jungle and had other people shoot at them, and that was why some of them limped and she should remember that it was because of them she did'nt have school today, she just looked at me funny and stared around the restraunt at the other vets.
I hadn't noticed an older gentleman sitting behind me in the other booth and I guess he had heard me talking to my granddaughter, as he was leaving he leaned over and looked at me and said, " we all didn't volunteer, but we went anyway" he looked at my granddaughter and told her to enjoy her day off from school. He was wearing a Korea vet cap, when he patted me on the shoulder and told me it sounded like she was being raised right. I seldom get emotional but that did cause my old eyes to water up.
I'm wrong about the PO, too. Our schools are open, however.
I guess I'm just a little bitter and cynical in my old age. It's true that almost everything I was promised when I raised my hand for the oath has been taken away. The VA system is poorly managed, grossly underfunded, and only a hint of what support ought to be given to veterans. And to get even that, it is up to us to "prove" we deserve it.
I worked a job a few years ago where everyone was a veteran.The foreman was a jarhead in Hue City during Tet.He said veterans day was for all veterans to work twice as hard,and we usually did.
Schools are closed here in North Carolina.
I joined as an E1.
I literally had nothing but opportunity.
I was given skills, friendships to last a lifetime, mentors, leadership, memories, stories to last a lifetime and a college education.
I also met my wife, while serving.
I ask nothing from the VA. I don’t expect a free food or a pat on the back.
What more could I ask for than what has already been given?
I don’t think many people hear my experience and it maybe the exception but I owe the military everything I am.
I didn't take the oath for the promises, and I've never taken it back. I swore to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign OR DOMESTIC, and that still holds, for me--left, right, or any other direction.
Dutchwind
I don't want anyone to think I signed up for the "bennies." But there are a lot of things I was promised that have been reneged upon.
Just as the thread title says, its all about perspective.
Rocky,
Don’t sweat some of the above comments. I get it. And, unfortunately, it’s not just the vets. I meet active duty families all the time who need food stamps or the county food pantry to make it through the month, or those forced into privatized government housing that leaves them without basic services for months on end. Even worse, a medical system that defers active duty appointments for weeks or months, with no options to go outside the system.
Folks love to tell them “thanks for your service.” Actions speak louder than words.