A Day To Remember

This past week my dad has re-watched Ken Burns' "The War" on his computer. Throughout the week I sat and watched a few segments with him. I was reminded that my dad was a part of this great war, albeit on the younger side of the spectrum: he was just out of high school when he joined the Navy in 1944.

Tom Harvill, WWII

His time in the Navy took him everywhere but overseas. Because of his lousy eyesight, he stayed back stateside as a hospital corpsman, working hand-in-hand with the Marines in a hospital at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. 

I'm glad because I have my dad to this day, and he's reliving the music, the culture and seeing the young faces of people close to his age, frozen in time,  throughout the Ken Burns documentary. He's almost 86-years-old, and many of the young people in the photos from the PBS special are mostly gone by now, even if they lived to a ripe old age. My dad is one of the last of a dying breed referred to as the "Greatest Generation."

Today we celebrate the bravery, selflessness and determination of tens of thousands of soldiers--men and women, both young and old--who sacrificed their lives for our freedom, at home and abroad. My dad was one who served in two wars: WWII and the Korean War. Without the bravery of people like my dad, we might today be speaking Japanese, German or even Russian as our first language in America. 

We remember the fallen today, as well as those who survived and were fortunate enough to return home to tell about their harrowing experiences. God bless you all!