However, as simple as it was, my mind turned it into something far more significant for me. As they were busy going through the almost rote observance my mind was remembering family members who had served. Our family's military service to American began with Samuel Appleby who march with the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War and continues to this day. Appleby's and/or their kin have fought in virtually every war in which this country has ever been engaged.
But as proud as I am of that service record I was not thinking this morning of all those who served. No, my mind was focused on a very elite group of family members. I was thinking of those family members who not only served but died as a result of that service.
As I sat their and they mentioned the Marine Corps I saw my father's youngest cousin, Billy Roy Appleby, a member of the 2nd Battalion, 7th Marines, 1st Marine Division. just turned twenty-one by a month, as he suddenly felt the impact of enemy fire and slumped in eternal sleep to the frozen ground in Korea on November 3, 1950.
Then they mentioned the Army and after a brief thought of my Dad dropping paratroopers in the early hours of the morning of the Normandy Invasion and then latter the entire week of Operation Market Garden I thought of his other cousin, Robert "Bobby" Key, who flew the same kind of airplane my Dad, entered eternal rest in the fiery crash of his plane as it exploded on take-off from Natal, Brazil from saboteurs bomb. That day the Nazi saboteurs destroyed five planes and their crews.
Then the Navy and my cousin Charlie Hancock's name came to mind. He paid the price aboard a U.S. Aircraft Carrier somewhere off the coast of Vietnam in the 1960's.
I don't know why I thought of these men but I did. But the real significance of all this is that while thinking of their sacrifice I also thought of my Grandfather's baby brother Jesse as he got the letter that his son had been killed in action and he was give a hand full of medals (Purple Heart, the Combat Action Ribbon, the Korean Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal and the Korean War Service Medal). I wondered how my grandfather's sister felt as she got word from the army that her son had died in Brazil. And how my grandmother's sister felt when word came that her grandson, a Navy Corpman. was dead.
I suspect they were experiencing what every mother, father, wife, and child of a U.S. Serviceman fears most as they say goodbye to their soldier and watch them walk away toward an uncertain but dangerous deployment. So on this Veteran's Day I want to say, "Thank you" to all the Moms and Dads, Wives and Husbands, and Children who are left behind. "Thank you for your service."
