Happy (belated) Memorial Day

We've started a yearly (okay, the past 2 years) tradition of going to the local Memorial Day parade. It's not a big parade or many entrants, but it's meaningful in so many ways. After the parade, we walk to the cemetery and the local band, boy scout troops and local VFW have a little ceremony with the 21 gun salute at the cemetery. This year, we took some little friends with us...

watching the Boy Scouts carry the American flag.

At the cemetery, the girls had many questions, the most popular one: "Why did these people die here?" They thought that the people buried at the cemetery actually died right there in the spots in which they were buried. Then they wanted to know where the people lived before they died, what did they die from, how old were they when they died (okay, I could figure that one out), will I die, when will I die? (and on and on and on....) I had to tell our little friends parents that the girls would probably have a lot more questions to come....

The best statement was from the 5 year old friend on the way to the parade. We talked about the parade and why we were going and that we were going to go to the cemetery as well to honor those that "fought the bad guys to keep us safe". The 5 year old said, "Well, my Uncle Mark is really old, I mean really, really, really old. He's like 19 years old!" I had to chuckle under my breath...