Freedom Is What Freedom Does
There’s been a lot of talk this past year about “Freedom!” …Freedom and “Tyranny!” …Tyranny and “My Rights!” How cheap we are, throwing those words around as if we own them. As if we even know what they mean.
Imagine, for just one moment, the most frightening experience in your life. We’re usually pretty good at remembering such things because they get burned into our brains. Now, imagine there is some kid — in the prime of their youth, their whole life ahead of them, never even been in love — being plucked from everything they know and thrown into more frightening things than you will ever see. And then imagine that kid living that horror, nonstop, trying as they might just to survive one day to the next. Day after day. Nightmare after nightmare.
Then, imagine telling them what you intend to do with that purchase — at the price of their one and only chance on earth. Imagine telling them that you will probably never do the same, that you won’t sacrifice even as much for someone else. Imagine crouching down over them, as they breathe their final breath, blood and dreams spilling out of their veins, and then you whisper into their ear, “Thanks, now I don’t have to wear a mask or get a vaccine.”
Because freedom. Because nowadays freedom means you get to do whatever the fuck you want. Freedom is like an all-expenses-paid tour to a worry-free life, you know, free of the “oppression” of having to actually give a shit about someone else. “Thanks, kid, you did me a solid. Now I have the freedom to live my life as I choose.”
Imagine that.
This year has been our test. This was our generation’s war. Would we sacrifice for another? Just like that kid did for us? Or do we believe their life got us off the hook? And then, in exchange, once a year, on Memorial Day, we promise to post a bunch of memes on Facebook so everyone can see how “patriotic” we are. How much we respect those kids. How much we remember. Horseshit.
In my humble opinion, we don’t honor the dead with memes and anthems and standing up to a flag. Far from it. We honor the dead by doing as they would, as they did. Selfless sacrifice. Not SELFISH. They did not win anything for us. WE are not who they fought and died for. They died for an idea. An idea of doing our best for one another. Making a difference in the lives of others. Making each life matter. Even if it costs us a little sacrifice of our own. Especially if it costs us. Because that little price we pay, those little selfless things we do, for no glory, THAT is when we remember. THAT is when we honor what they gave. By giving too. Paying back. Paying forward.
Talk is cheap.
