The need to create attachments on Memorial Day …

What we see and perceive is microscopic to all that is going on around us.

And, for that matter, for us.

At any given time, there are people serving us. Police are patrolling the streets, firefighters remain on the ready, hospitals are staffed, convenience stores are being stocked, gas stations are pumping fuel, restaurants are ready to take your order … and the men and women of the United States military are on duty all around the world.

This is just some of what is happening all the time to meet our needs; strangers serving us 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days per year, all without our observation or even our perception. But they’re there, and they’re working, all for us.

We can intellectually understand that when or if we think about it, but fostering sincere gratitude that comes from someone we’ve never even heard of personally serving us is harder to do when most of their work is imperceptible by us. That’s why we need to create “attachments” so that we can more fully understand what’s being done on our behalf, and respond with authentic appreciation.

We create attachments by learning about the people and work being done on our behalf; by becoming aware of real people and their sacrifices. Hearing the stories of men and women who give their lives in service of country — us! — helps us to learn names and put faces to those names. We can mentally AND emotionally attach ourselves to (or “connect” with) real people, even if we never have a chance to meet them.

When it comes to Memorial Day, we can more genuinely memorialize those who have died in service to their country by making the time to hear the stories of real people who have made real sacrifices on our behalf. As we mark this day of memorial that remembers and honors those men and women who made the ultimate sacrifices of their lives on our behalf as part of their military service, try to go beyond mental assent about such great sacrifice, and understand these were real people — husbands and wives, moms and dads, sons and daughters, who died in service. The loss of each life devastated many lives left behind, there was nothing at all “intellectual” about the reality of their deaths to the people who personally knew and loved them.

Can you tell some stories you’ve learned of specific people who lost their lives in service to our country? When you can tell your children, or talk with friends, of real people lost, it deepens your personal gratitude for what has been done for you. This Memorial Day, let me encourage you to try to make some attachments so that your appreciation for those lost in service to our country can run a little deeper.

Scotty