AND THEN I WROTE ...

...that if assorted aches and pains and adult onset illnesses don't remind us senior citizens of our mortality, someone else certainly will.
My last aunt was buried over the Memorial Day weekend.
Fifty years ago, I had 15 aunts and uncles living.
When I mentioned that to a first cousin who is a couple years older than I am, she remarked very matter of factly: “Well, we are the older generation now, you know!”
Then Monday, I heard Kathy Campbell speak at Waukon's Memorial Day observance, and among other things, she suggested it was her generation's responsibility to instill the sense of pride and patriotism which military service represents into today's young people.
Since I knew Kathy as one of those “young people” a couple or three decades ago, my initial reaction was: “Hey! That used be our job; the job of my generation!”      
Frankly, retired, retiring or about to be retired, I really don't think we did a very good job of it.
World War II was our “signature” war, as pop music critics might term it. But as the roll was called at Oakland Cemetery this May, the list of WWII vets recognized was brief. Veterans of that war of 55 to 59 years ago are becoming fewer each year as they age through their 70s and 80s.
For those of us in our 60s, WWII was very real, and all-consuming, although we were too young for actual combat service.
The Korean Conflict was also “our” war, but we lacked the national commitment and quit before winning that war; stopped at an imaginary line on the map. How many of you have ever wondered what might have happened if we had pursued the Chicoms over the 38th parallel to victory?
By Vietnam, I suppose I was already working in the “next” generation, since I was serving on the Selective Service (draft) board by then. Some of us adults who supported America's involvement in Southeast Asia were puzzled by the fact that many, including most young people of draft and college age, did not. We obviously had not sold the American responsibility program well to the next generation. So that became another armed conflict from which the formerly United States of America bailed out.
Have any of you ever wondered what might have happened had the nation had the will to win that war? We certainly would have had the capability, had we committed to it.
And so, for the first time, a group of American veterans returned home to something less than a hero's welcome. If failing to win that war was a shame, the lack of appreciation for those who served there was an even greater national shame.
Kathy and husband Bill and their generation have a tremendous task ahead of them if they are to succeed any better than my generation.
Over the weekend, people stole flags donated by families of veterans from an Iowa small town's display. Local veterans have felt it necessary to post guards over the beautiful Avenue of Flags around the courthouse to prevent similar destruction. Folks, those flags should be sacrosanct! Veterans of that small Iowa town say if the flags are returned, they will ask no questions and not pursue criminal charges.
My punishment would be to bring the offenders before a group of veterans for a little conference. I suspect some minds would be changed in short order.
But maybe not.
Maybe in addition to giving up on wars and fighting wars from long distance, we have not even instilled in the subsequent generations the importance of the American way of life. Maybe adult leaders who are members of the generation after Bill and Kathy's and before today's really young people don't share those same values.
As I said, the Vietnam generation may have its work cut out for it. I hope they don't cut and run, as the nation has done.

- Dick Schilling