Honor and Sacrifice

Service is asked of all of us.

The rifle, helmet and boot symbolizing a fallen service on the edge to the reflection pool at the Women in Military Service for America Memorial building.

Memorial Day 2023--Arlington, Virginia, honoring those who have served.

On a previous Memorial Day, before the pandemic, before confusion about standing up for the Constitution, in 2018, I spent Memorial Day in nearby Arlington Cemetery. I used to walk through Arlington with my German shepherd (when they allowed dogs in Arlington Cemetery, where combat dogs are buried) and ponder dying for something larger than the self. I came across Cap Weinberger's new grave by surprise one day, shocked that he had passed. There are graves in Arlington from the Lee family from before the Civil War, when the estate belonged to General Robert Lee and not the United States. I walked the graves (before getting searched was required to enter the national cemetery) of polar explorers, Supreme Court justices, the Kennedy family, Indian fighters, astronauts, Lincoln's family, and other luminaries and soldiers.

In 2018, Iraq War Army veteran Ben King brought mindful practice to Arlington Cemetery that he had been bringing to veterans. His Mindful Memorial Foundation has used mindful practice to focus on an experience of remembering and honoring service members killed while serving since September 11, 2001. My friend Rosemary was supporting the mindful practice with a gong meditation in front of the Women in Military Service for America Memorial building at Arlington. Inside the lobby of the museum hung thousands of yellow ribbon lanyards and the names of the fallen. Our instructions were simple: find the gravesite and acknowledge that person's sacrifice.

I picked a woman's name, of course. I navigated to Section 60 of Arlington Cemetery, which is where the soldiers buried since 9/11 are found. The marble gravestone standing solidly between blades of grass shining in the sun had twelve names. Marilyn Gabbard had died in a helicopter crash, shot down in Iraq January 20, 2007. I said a prayer for peace and gratitude. Section 60 saw lots of tears from visiting family that beautiful sunny, summer day.

Marilyn Gabbard and crewmates rest together in Section 60, Arlington Cemetery.

May 29, 2023 is a cloudy, more somber day than that sunny day, more in keeping with the occasion. A quiet weekend by comparison with the days when Rolling Thunder brought motorcycles in from across the Nation to honor veterans and rumbled my neighborhood throughout the three days of the holiday. And so I take this moment to focus my mind on the honor and sacrifice of those who have stepped up, like my father, who volunteered to be a naval aviator during World War II.

"Service to country" is something that holds deep meaning for most Americans. I can't speak to other countries, though I imagine it pertains. Ukraine certainly provides an extreme example of dedication to country and how profound that commitment is. General Mark Milley suggests inspiration should lead intimidation in projecting dimensions of power. Ukraine is waging an astonishingly successful war of inspiration.

For me, there are many paths of service to country. Before military conflict, there is service to others on behalf of country. The US Naval Ship Mercy, for example, has provided needed hospital services to support U.S. disaster relief and humanitarian operations worldwide. Easy to think of times the national Guard has been called in to help people in distress after natural disasters. Service is one of those actions that spreads out in ripple effects that are often unknown to the person at the source of the action. My ex-Navy friend Kristin said engineers who worked for her who were from Vietnam told her their commitment to the U.S. Navy formed when our ships rescued them on the sea as they fled Vietnam and starvation.

My niece taught in inner city schools in Los Angeles for AmeriCorps. I served in the Peace Corps in Mali, West Africa in 1985-1986 (before cell phones). We swore to uphold the Constitution, too. One of the older volunteers I worked with had been a Marine. He considered this service a counterpoint to his military service. The three goals of the Peace Corps were to provide help, promote cross-cultural understanding and friendship, and bring that back home. I helped bring home an accomplished student I taught. She lives in the metropolitan Washington area with her twin daughters and has gone to Kabul with the State Department supporting education for women. Imagine the role model supplied by a tall, beautiful black professional Muslim woman representing America. When questioned by Afghan colleagues, she could point out her name was the same as the wife of the prophet Mohammed, who was literate, where he was not, and could write down his words, and who was a business woman who supported them financially.

My sister Astronaut Janice Voss flew five missions on the Space Shuttle. Even as political conflict envelopes relations between the U.S. and Russia, Russian-American cooperation on the International Space Station reaches across boundaries. The politics of the Space Race was as much a race to prove which country could be a global technological leader as a race to the Moon, which was critical to alliances for America in the 1960s. In our current era, NASA is establishing a foundation for international cooperation within and outside our solar system. NASA Headquarters saw Czechoslovakia sign the Artemis Accords last month and Colombia before that.

Deputy Administrator of NASA, Pam Melroy confers with Vice President and Foreign Minister Marta Lucía Ramírez of Columbia before signing the Artemis Accords, May 10, 2022.

My service pales by comparison to the honor and sacrifice of those in uniform in extremis. A very public example of service elevated to heroism is Senator John McCain. I also think of the sacrifices of others such as Tammy Duckworth and Daniel Inouye, who went on to distinguished public service in the United States Senate after their military service.

There are many ways to serve. Putting your life at risk is the highest service. But service is all around us. Service is asked of all of us.