Posted on 05/26/2003 5:24:12 PM PDT by Diddle E. Squat
When she lived in her native Poland, Danuta Kowalik would bring her two young boys to a cemetery this time of year and solemnly visit the dead soldiers.
"Somebody," she would explain, "needs to say ‘Thank you' to them."
When she moved to Chicago's suburbs in 1991, Kowalik kept the tradition, changing only the day of the visits. Instead of the early May anniversary of Germany's World War II surrender, she adopted America's Memorial Day.
This year, she'll be going back to a cemetery, but so much has changed. Today, she will be saying ‘Thank you' to her own soldier, son Jakub, a 21-year-old Marine killed in Iraq on May 12.
"I never imagined he would be one of those heroes in the cemetery," the Schaumburg woman says, her voice filled with sorrow.
America has thousands of new heroes this Memorial Day. The wars against terrorism in Afghanistan and now Iraq have left 241 U.S. soldiers dead and 716 wounded. Of the dead, 162 died in Operation Iraqi Freedom since March. Tens of thousands of men and women are still deployed in those countries -- and veterans back home are hoping it's enough to make people remember what Memorial Day is all about.
It's not just supposed to be the unofficial start of summer, the day the grill comes out, the reason for a blowout sale or the lifting of the ban on wearing white. It's more than a three-day weekend, they say.
It's the solemn day to honor fallen soldiers.
"I'm a retired military officer. I've been stationed around the country, and that was always my feeling" about the public perception of Memorial Day, says Jim Hughes, director of the Memorial Day Museum in the holiday's acknowledged birthplace, Waterloo, N.Y.
"It was the weekend to start the summer, to have a cookout, to go boating," he said. "It bothers me, but I'm not going to castigate these people. By having a three-day weekend, I don't see how to avoid it, unfortunately."
Some local vets think this could be the year for the meaning to crystallize in the public's mind, and for that meaning to stretch further than to just the people who typically turn out every year.
"I think people are more patriotic now. They think a little bit more of the veterans," says Henry Youngquist, 83, a World War II bomber pilot from Mount Prospect. "I think more of the younger people are coming around to appreciate their GIs because of the situation in the world. I think the teachers are doing a good job."
Joe Macejak, a National Guard reservist for 39½ years, sold red cloth poppies for the American Legion this week at a nice clip. He thinks the war in Iraq will help change people's thoughts about Memorial Day.
"I think a lot of people will consider it differently," the Northwest Side of Chicago man said while selling the flower tributes. "Memorial Day actually has lost a lot of its meaning. Now it's more commercialized. There's not that many people who go to the cemeteries to remember their veterans, their families, their friends.
"Hopefully, people will find it in their hearts to remember what the day is really for, not just a joyous weekend," he said. "It should be a day of remembrance and prayers."
A total of 162 U.S. soldiers have died in and around Iraq since March, including Jakub Kowalik and Marine Corps First Lt. Timothy Ryan, 30, a native of Aurora killed in a helicopter crash near Baghdad May 19. And Petty Officer 3rd Class Dwayne Williams, 23, of Philadelphia, was presumed dead Sunday, having fallen off his ship while on the way home from Iraq.
Another 495 have been wounded, and some 150,000 troops are still deployed there.
Since U.S. troops moved into Afghanistan in the months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, 79 American soldiers have died there and another 221 have been wounded, according to the Department of Defense. Among the dead is Illinois Air National Guard Staff Sgt. Jacob Frazier, 24, of St. Charles, who was killed there March 29.
The casualties, veterans say, are all reminders of the meaning of Memorial Day, which dates back to 1866. It was formalized as a day of remembrance in 1868, when Gen. John A. Logan of the Grand Army of the Republic set aside a Decoration Day to honor the sacrifices of Civil War soldiers.
"The 30th of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet churchyard in the land," Logan's order declared.
The holiday later became Memorial Day, and Congress in 1971 declared it a national holiday to be celebrated on the last Monday in May. Some veterans, like museum director Hughes, believe moving the holiday back to May 30 would underscore its meaning because it wouldn't always be a three-day weekend.
The long weekend does allow for several days worth of memorial events, but most of the events locally are on Monday.
Communities around the country, including scores around the suburbs, will mark the day with parades, remembrance ceremonies and prayers. Many of the events, such as the annual Arlington Heights parade sponsored by Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 981, are usually well-attended. But there is a belief that, in times of peace, the holiday loses its meaning to much of the country.
For Danuta Kowalik, however, it's never lost its meaning. It's just far more painful now.
She had hoped Jakub, whom she last saw in September, would be back from Iraq by now, hugging her. "A hero who is alive next to me," she says.
But Jakub was killed when an ordnance he was handling exploded. And he's still not home yet. His body is en route, and a funeral is planned for Wednesday.
So his mother will pray alone today by the empty grave reserved for him in Maryhill Cemetery in Niles.
It will be a day of sadness for her, but she wants the community to not just remember and honor all of the fallen soldiers, but to also celebrate life.
"They need to celebrate and enjoy their life," she said. "Somebody lost their life for them to be happy."
Memorial: Holiday dates back to 1866
"It's the solemn day to honor fallen heroes"
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