Rows - Carmi's theme

Carmi's theme this week is "rows." My mind immediately went back to Washington DC and the trip that my son and daughter-in-law gave to me for a birthday present this year. We spent most of our time on the mall visiting the monuments and memorials. The newest, the World War II memorial, has a wall of stars, 4,000 of them, which represent the more than 400,000 lives lost during those years. If you scroll down, you will see another photo of this wall. Below the marble band at the bottom, you see the stars reflected in the pool beneath it.

When I visited Washington a few years ago, it was in June, and I literally became ill from the heat. The ladies I was with and I rode the trolley to see the sights, a great way to go, by the way. You can hop on and off all day. When we got to the Jefferson Memorial, I looked for the gift shop because it was cool there. We rode on to the Lincoln Memorial, and I was so hot and almost overcome by the heat that I told my friends I had to go back to the hotel. They went on to see the Vietnam Wall.

I missed seeing it that day, but I didn't miss it this time. My husband served in the Air Force in Vietnam and came home. Many did not. This wall has row after row of names of those people who lost their lives there. Some were there rubbing names onto paper. This gentleman was down on his knee with his phone out, taking the photo of the name of his loved one.

I just read that it was on this day in 1982 that the Vietnam Memorial was dedicated.

Rows...reminders.

World War II Memorial

Perhaps the most moving moments for me were at the World War II Memorial. Many veterans of the war were there. I know it has been the goal of many to visit there before they die. There were many in wheelchairs; many walking around using oxygen. A very dear friend who is a missionary in the Dominican Republic was home on assignment a couple of years ago, and one of the first things he did was to take his dad, a veteran of WWII to the memorial so that he could witness it.

I took many photos of the towers, the fountain, the quotes in stone, but the most moving were the photos of the veterans. I talked with a couple of them as I stood by the pool. I shared with them that my father had volunteered or been drafted, I'm not sure which, but when he arrived at Camp Blanding in Florida, he was 4-F, so he returned to Lacoochee. There he worked as a foreman in the lumber mill and guarded German war prisoners who were brought to the States to work in places like Lacoochee who had sent their young men to war.

I was born in September of 1941, just four months before Pearl Harbor. Being that young, I remember very little, but I do remember the day the war was declared over. In that little sawmill town, there was the honking of horns and people on the wooden sidewalks, crying "The war is over!"

WWII Memorial

The memorial honors the 16 million who served in the armed forces of the U.S. during World War II, the more than 400,000 who died, and the millions who supported the war effort from home. Symbolic of the defining event of the 20th Century, the memorial is a monument to the spirit, sacrifice, and commitment of the American people to the common defense of the nation and to the broader causes of peace and freedom from tyranny throughout the world. It will inspire future generations of Americans, deepening their appreciation of what the World War II generation accomplished in securing freedom and democracy. Above all, the memorial stands as an important symbol of American national unity, a timeless reminder of the moral strength and awesome power that can flow when a free people are at once united and bonded together in a common and just cause.

This is just a part of one of the many bas-relief sculptures depicting scenes from the war.

Be sure to click on the photos to see the detail.