We conducted a test run yesterday.
Burgers stuffed with onion and cheddar cheese were grilled and consumed, and a quick decision was made not to prepare them for today’s mini picnic with the family. The experiment was performed to help replace the feast that is common on this day off (and it is one for me because I’ve not missed a day on air, with my work for Right At Home, or with LEDE News since this pandemic changed all of our lives (And no, I’m not looking for praise.), but it was a failure, so we will resort to sweet and hot sausage, blackened flounder, baked beans with hot dog slices, and Riesbeck’s potato salad.
Ho-hum compared to the annual smorgasbord with burgers, dogs, kielbasa, sausage links, chicken legs, deviled eggs, green bean casserole, roasted corn on the cob, rice and cheese casserole, homemade potato salad, beet salad made by my mom, and the spear pickle-cucumber-cheese-and-olive tray of deliciousness.
But nope, we also are only four and not the 10 or 20 or 30 friends and family we’re used to on days like this, and sure it will still be a lot of work to get it all ready for a 5 p.m. sit-down after some cornhole in the side yard.
None of the prep work, though, will begin before we socially distance our way to kind of attend Wheeling Post 1’s makeshift Memorial Day Service at the Veteran’s Amphitheater in downtown Wheeling. It is an 11 a.m. event that is closed to the public and may be broadcast on Facebook Live, but there are areas just outside the venue that will allow us to be close enough to pay tribute to those who perished while defending the freedoms we all take for granted, and yes, even during this pandemic.
In fact, many have complained during the month of May on social media platforms about their American rights being squelched by the measures enacted by state governments, so maybe – just maybe – today they will recall, and pay tribute, to the men and women who afforded them the reason why the complainers have the freedom to openly disagree with the restrictions.
The people we honor on Memorial Day each year are dead today because they were killed in the line of duty, and their families are honored with the Gold Star Memorial Monument at Heritage Port. Each year, all Americans who served our country in one of the branches are celebrated each November, but today is about nothing more than those killed in action.
And they died for me and for you so we can do things like grill bad burgers.
