When I was a small boy, one of the most vivid moments in my year, and for everyone else in the United States at that time in the thirties and forties, came at eleven o’clock on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, Armistice Day. The bells on the churches tolled, the factory whistles blew loudly and then the whole town fell silent. Street cars and buses stopped, shop cash registers ceased to ring, men and women in offices and factories, women in their kitchens at home, wherever it was humanly possible, people stopped for two minutes to remember those who had died in the great World Wars. As a child, I was struck with a deep felt awe at this amazing spectacle and the silence formed a part of my year as impressive, if not as personally rewarding as Christmas.
After World War II, and for a few short years thereafter, this splendid tradition was kept alive. But then, as a new generation began, we jumped onto the swings of fashion and becoming more involved in our personal pleasures, Armistice Day, like so many others of our precious traditions, was quietly dropped. Not instantly, for that wouldn’t be decent. Television stations still broadcast, but for only a few seconds, memorial services being conducted at local cemeteries by various veterans groups. The nation’s conscience has been satisfied. WHAT HYPOCRITES WE ARE!
You know, sometimes I can’t help but wonder, whether some of today’s shallow society really deserves the freedom and prosperity that those clean living, courageous men and women earned for them with their bravery and their lives. Let us bring back that one unique moment in the American year, when everyone, everywhere in this great land of ours, stops and thinks and prays. Let the clatter of the supermarket check out registers be muted. Stop the blare of the nonstop radio station’s continuous variety of musical selections, the grinding of the traffic, the yelling, the shouting and the combination of noises that make up our modern day way of living, just for two minutes.
In that wondrous spell of silence, think not only of those who made the supreme sacrifice in the two World Wars, but also those who gave their lives in the Korean War, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf War and now in Iraq. Remember the men and women who have died and are still dying by the hands of terrorists in the Middle East and more recently, September eleventh, the Pentagon and that small strip of farmland in Pennsylvania.
Somehow, I think, in these two minutes, we could forget the pay envelopes, the politics and the petty bigotries that divide us. In these two minutes, regardless of color, class or creed, we could become one nation, one happy breed again.
Then, perhaps, other countries would join us, men of all nations uniting in a common, silent prayer for peace and goodwill throughout the world.
Perhaps I am an idealist, out of touch with reality. Perhaps I expect too much. But this, the eleventh month, at eleven o’clock on the eleventh day, quietly and without fuss, I will observe the two-minute silence once again. Won’t you join me in spirit wherever you are? Remember, our nation’s sons and daughters gave their whole lives for America, won’t you give just two minutes?
All content on this site is the property of Oakley Lodge #668 F&AM, unless otherwise noted. ©2007