We Will Remember Them

I was woken early this morning by the cats again, so turned on the television to see if there was an ANZAC Day dawn service on and found for some inexplicable reason a service from a fairly small town in Queensland, Currumbin.  But how moving and how beautiful a tribute to all the fallen, in all the wars, the horrible senseless wars.

ANZAC Day is particularly personal to me and always will be.  Especially since it is so close to the anniversary of my father's death.  I am convinced that Dad's wartime experience, he was a bomber pilot in the RAAF during WWII, directly caused his alcoholism which pretty much caused his early death at just 58.  Dad didn't drink or smoke before he went overseas.  The airforce gave the men cigarettes and encouraged a culture of drinking to the extent that many a young man came home with a grog habit that lasted a lifetime.

Like many war veterans, my Dad didn't talk about it much, except sometimes when he was drunk, and the trauma then was evident, mostly that the squadron would go out on their nightly missions and come back sorely short of planes.  His comrades were severely diminished by the end of the war.

I think it's wonderful how the young ones mark this day, I know when I was a child we tended to dismiss the ANZAC story as something for the oldies, like "get over it already" because we just didn't understand. 

Now I understand.