A Day To Honor, A Day to Heal
Fort Logan National Cemetery, May 26, 2025
Like many veterans and civilians, I have spent all of my post-military Memorial Day weekends at home, watching war movies and barbecuing. I felt as if I had always respected the holiday for its intent. I held my own moments of silence for our fallen and quietly felt the gratitude we should all keep for those who gave all for our liberty. I thought I was doing enough. Maybe it is the wisdom that comes with age that makes me feel that I have not given enough back in honor of those who fell.
I am a US Navy Veteran who served aboard the USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63), 1991 - 1995. I made two wartime deployments to the western Pacific (WESTPAC), where we were involved in two missions in support of keeping Iraq, the seas, and airspace free of threats. As a wartime sailor in the US Navy, the threat of imminent danger is much lower than for those that are on the ground. Though life on a warship has its own dangers that are present 24/7 when underway. I only point this out because for years, I believed my service wasn't impactful. I didn't really believe that my service was important within the bigger picture. I have since learned that there is no part of honorable military service that is less important than any other. It takes everyone to turn the wheels of our military, from the men and women in the pentagon, down to the men and women who have their operational assignments, and still keep everything clean and in good repair. Sometimes, scrubbing the heads, sweeping passageways and painting bulkheads seems like meaningless work, but when your ship has a service life of 50 years, you begin to see the bigger picture.
This year I was invited to spend Memorial Day at Fort Logan National Cemetery to observe the ceremonies in a way that I never have. The skies were overcast and seemed to set a reflective mood. The morning was filled with the voices of those who shared stories that honored our fallen heroes. There were many stories of names you would have never known and how they served all of us. There were stories of our military heroes that lost their lives in ways that were a result of their wartime service and not the combat actions themselves. It was a ceremony of quiet tears and gratitude, and by the end of it my emotions remained close at hand. But, the events were not yet complete.
I met Neil for the first time at our Cornhole Tournament in February of this year. Kim had introduced us. A couple of months ago, she told me about Neil's ceremony that takes place on Memorial Day, though I didn't really understand the gravity of it at the time. My stepfather was interred at Fort Logan on his birthday last August. Kim asked if I would like him to be included in the ceremony. I agreed as I felt like it would one more way to honor someone I love and immensely respect.
An Army Infantry veteran, Neil is a little enigmatic in that I don't know much of his story. Though I barely know him, I have great respect and admiration for him. I do know that his combat scars have left him with questions about having survived while others didn't. For Neil, that pain is ever-present. It seems that there isn't a day that passes where he isn't grateful for those who fell, where he tries to live in ways that honor their memory.
Every year, Neil holds his own ceremony at Fort Logan. He spends weeks preparing for it. He first crafts his own memorial and has dog tags made for those he needs to honor. His memorial is placed near the main stage at Fort Logan before the ceremonies begin. Then at the end of the main Fort Logan ceremony, Neil moves to his memorial and, one by one, he places the dog tags of his fallen on the board. He made tags for my stepfather and allowed me to place them on the board. It was very moving and a lot of tears were shed during the ceremony. Neil said it is his way to honor those that fell, and it also helps to wash away some of the ever-present pain of a survivor until next year. It is cleansing and therapeutic. The board, with its dog tags hanging, is left behind as a way to bring them home; as a way to keep them in our hearts.
At the end of Neil's ceremony, I felt a lot like a rain cloud after a thunderstorm; a little empty with a few raindrops still threatening to fall. Thank you, Neil, for including me in your memorial. You are a man of honor, Brother, and we thank you with love and gratitude...
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