What is a Veteran

Granny, Gadfly and I don't get many comments on our posts these days but I do still get emails from readers now and then. The following is from an email I received.

What Is a Veteran? Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing limb, a jagged scar, a certain look in the eye. Others may carry the evidence inside them: a pin holding a bone together, a piece of shrapnel in the leg - or perhaps another sort of inner steel: the soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity. Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept America safe wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking. What is a vet? He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carriers didn't run out of fuel. He is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the cosmic scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th parallel. She - or he - is the nurse who fought against futility and went to sleep sobbing every night for 12 solid months in DaNang. He is the POW who went away one person and came back another - or didn't come back AT ALL. He is the Quantico drill instructor that has never seen combat - but has saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and gang members into Marines, and teaching them to watch each other's backs. He is the parade-riding Legionnaire who pins on his ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand.He is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and medals pass him by. He is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns, whose presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever preserve the memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor dies unrecognized with them on the battlefield or in the ocean's sunless deep. He is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket - palsied now and aggravatingly slow - who helped liberate a Nazi death camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still alive to hold him when the nightmares come. He is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being, a person who offered some of his life's most vital years in the service of his country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so others would not have to sacrifice theirs. He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and he is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known. So remember, each time you see someone who has served our country, just lean over and say Thank You. That's all most people need, and in most cases it will mean more than any medals they could have been awarded or were awarded. Author Unknown ......................................................................... Excerpt from "Sacrificed For Empire", march, 2007 Veterans Day 2004 - World War II veteran and Pearl Harbor survivor, Houston James, emotionally embracing Iraq War veteran, Marine Sgt. Mark Graunke, Jr., who lost a hand, leg, and eye when defusing a bomb in 2003. "I have posted the above photo before and will probably post it again. It is a poignant reminder of the cost of war and what we as a nation owe our warriors. This old veteran of WWII Pearl Harbor and the young Iraqi War marine symbolize the generations of men and women who have gone off to war at the behest of our government, served honorably and well, and all too often were ignored once their service was completed." Comments: Farnsworth68 said... Thank you. Sunday, September 27, 2009 1:16:00 PM Worried American said... You are very welcome, Farnsworth. And THANK YOU!! Monday, September 28, 2009 12:12:00 AM Spadoman said... Thanks. Monday, September 28, 2009 5:32:00 AM Worried American said... Spadoman; thank you for visiting us and Thank You. I have commented on your blog. I don't visit you often but always enjoy your traveling narratives. Tuesday, September 29, 2009 8:26:00 PM Spadoman; thank you for visiting us and Thank You. I have commented on your blog. I don't visit you often but always enjoy your traveling narratives. Tuesday, September 29, 2009 8:26:00 PM Spadoman said... No, Thanks to you. Remember THIS Saturday, October 03, 2009 5:15:00 AM Worried: Do check out Spadoman's link above. Excellent piece.