Memorial Day Thoughts

The silence in Berkeley this past weekend has been deafening. Adam and I have taken several walks in our neighborhood and seen almost no one. There's very little traffic (which, I must say, is awesome) and the stores and restaurants just seem kind of dead. It feels just a little bit lonely.

The weather has been miserable this weekend, too. Chilly, gray, cloudy; I think it rained on Saturday night. It's oddly depressing and super confusing, considering last weekend it was 100 degrees in the shade. It was so hot the UC Davis sticker on the back of my car melted and burned into oblivion. This weekend, it's practically frozen back on.

All this has made me eerily pensive about Memorial Day. I once viewed the holiday as nothing more than a day off from school, tinged by the scent of grilled meat and frisbees gliding through the air. I used to think nothing of it; just an extended weekend, a day for sleeping in.

But today, for some reason, Memorial Day 2008 has taken on a different persona. This is the first year I've ever really thought about what the day means. Today for the first time, I stopped flipping through the channels when I got to Fox News, only for a moment, to observe the feed from memorial services for soldiers in Iraq or elsewhere.

I've spent a lot of the day thinking that Memorial Day honors those who died while they were doing their job. Men and women who handed themselves over to the government and said, "Here I am. I want to defend my country. Take me and train me. Do what you want with me. I'm willing. I'm ready." Of course, Memorial Day also honors those who perhaps weren't so willing. People who were forced, drafted, or pushed into doing something they didn't necessarily want to do. Those people gave their lives, too.

Memorial Day is not about politics. It's not about Bush or Barack, Hillary or Johnny MC; it's about people. Ordinary men and women who are no longer living. People who died doing what they were assigned to do: defend... whatever that word entails. And I think those people deserve to be honored, remembered, and thought about. So, I'm thinking about them today.

Next year in Jerusalem, I will experience a Memorial Day unlike any I've thought about before. Yom HaZikaron, which always falls the day before Israel's Independence Day, is a day unlike any other. There is a buzzer and everything stops; people get out of their cars and leave their offices to gather together and think: think about the many, many people who came before them. They gave themselves while defending their country. Defend... what does that word mean, anyway?

As my departure date draws closer, I get more and more excited and freaked out. Sometimes both emotions hit me in waves, and it's like a roller coaster to observe. What I look forward to most is having my mind open up as it never has before. Submerging myself in a completely different way of living life; experiencing what life has to offer in a completely new environment. Celebrating holidays and memorial days in a country so far away from my cozy California home. I look forward to having my mind blown in so many ways next year.

Bring it on.