~a person once lived and had a story to tell~

I took a bit of a respite from school today and headed with Mike up to Lawton, a city only about half an hour away from home here along the Red River.  While we were there, we met up with my sister Sherry and brother-in-law Wes and spent the day visiting some places that I'd always wanted to see but hadn't yet gone to since we have been here.

Today was the day.

We journeyed to the local Army base in Lawton where we discovered the Apache Indian cemetery where the final remains of the great Apache chief named Geronimo are buried.  It had been several years since I had been there, in fact the last time was when my oldest son was only 5 years old.  Time had dimmed my memory a bit as to the exact location of his final resting spot, but we soon found it just where it had been all along.  It was nice to see it again and to walk with my sister to the very spot that we both stood together in way back in 1985.  By the looks of the coins scattered around the grave and upon his grave marker, we were not the only ones who have visited lately.

I was not familiar with the tradition of leaving money upon the graves of the fallen.  Mike explained to me that it was a ritual that has been going on for some time now.  The coins signify that one has paid a visit.  There were so many of them strewn about not only this grave but others as well.  They remained untouched.

Way back in 1985, Sherry and I brought our little children here to visit.  Not sure if they remember coming with their mommas but we remembered it today.

These two guys enjoyed walking around the graves and reading the stones.  It was like a living history lesson there amongst the dead.

After we finished lunch we decided to head out of town for a bit towards the national cemetery for Ft. Still.  I had often seen the sign for it as I drove back and forth to Kansas over the course of the last year but had never stopped to see it.  I was so glad that we did today.  I've been to many cemeteries over the course of my 6 decades of life, but this one was by far the most peaceful and serene of them all.

The volunteer caretaker for today described this magnificent place as a "100 year cemetery" that offers a place of final rest to any veteran, no matter what branch of service that they served under.  Just as an aside, he noticed the KU t-shirt that I was wearing and asked me if I was indeed from Kansas.  After I gave him the 60-second version of my life, he told me with a smile on his face that he was a Jayhawker as well, hailing from the wonderful town of Abilene, Kansas.  It was so nice to meet him and to realize that a fellow Kansan was taking care of this hallowed and most holy ground today.

It was so remarkable to see the neatly arranged, "straight as an arrow" rows of white markers denoting the person whose grave it was as well as their rank and branch of service.  Well over 4,000 folks have chosen this spot as the place of their final rest.  It was fascinating to walk amongst the graves and read the inscriptions on the markers.  Some were very young and others were quite old. They had one thing in common.

They served their country.

This was just a small sampling of graves that are spread out on over 390 acres of land.

Before we left, I stopped to take a photo of Old Glory as she waved in the mid-afternoon breeze.  The robin's egg blue, late summer sky was filled with interesting little puffy white clouds and the red, white, and blue of our flag made quite an impression as it flew from that flagstaff.

There was something very peaceful about the sight of our nation's flag waving in the breeze of a southwestern Oklahoma sky.  I thought about my 3rd graders at Big Pasture and the discussions that we have had about how important it is to honor that flag by pledging allegiance to it each and every day.  I remembered that two years ago, back in the mountains of southwestern Colorado, just how wonderful it was to have Lizzie Corn's grandpa come and hold the flag for us on Veteran's Day that year.  That big guy was a soldier of the Vietnam War and he came to school to tell the kids a little bit about what it was like to have served in a very unpopular war for its time.  Before he left, I asked him if he would hold the flag for us so we could pledge our allegiance to it together as a class.  That kind man didn't hesitate for a moment.  It was so touching to see him holding that classroom flag in his left hand and placing his right hand over his heart.  It was my favorite kind of lesson.

It was a life one.

And so the day is done.  I'm sitting at the kitchen table typing this with the sun going down in the west in the window right behind me.  We were gone all day long and when we awake tomorrow, there will only be one day of the weekend left for us to enjoy.  There were plenty of things that I could have done at school today.  There are lesson plans to make, papers to grade, a room to finish tidying up and a whole lot of reports to look at.  But you know what?  I'm thankful that I didn't worry about it. I'm glad that I took a moment from a really busy life to remember history and most of all, to spend precious time with my family.

As a child, I was taught many lessons by my folks.  One of those lessons was to always remember to honor the living but an even greater admonition they gave me was to honor the dead as well.  Today I did just that.

For every name that I read on a grave marker, a person once lived and had a story to tell.  May we never forget their sacrifices and service to this great country of ours.

It took an act of Congress, well kinda/sorta, for Mike and I to get on base.  Once we were cleared, we headed out to Geronimo's grave.  We are always up for an adventure, especially one that involves Sherry and Wes.

I suppose that sometimes people might think that these two girls find plenty of trouble to get into. That's just a rumor.  We hardly ever get in trouble.  Just from time to time.