Remembering Uncle Arnie


Back when I was frequently a smart-mouth teen, Memorial Day didn’t mean a whole lot. It was a day off from school. 

As my girlfriend and I walked home from school, I was bitterly complaining that our Memorial vacation was going to be ruined by the social studies essay our teacher had assigned. 

I griped the whole way to her house. She was silent.




She invited me in and walked to the living room where she reached for a picture on a bookshelf. She  handed it to me. I looked at the old black and white photo of a young man in a Navy uniform. 

She’d never met her Uncle Arnie. But to her dad, Arnie was a hero. She’d heard all the war stories again and again—and each time, Arnie was spoken of with honor. When World War II had started in Europe, her uncle enlisted. Her dad had watched Arnie ship off for a base in Hawaii. It seemed safe, but he missed his brother terribly. Then December 7, 1941 changed all their lives forever. 

Her uncle was among those who grabbed one of the anti-aircraft gunners, desperately shooting at the low-flying planes. A story that was shared by a survivor told of him being burned horrifically by the nearby inferno and continuing to fire his weapon until he collapsed and died.

My friend took the picture I’d been holding and gently placed it back on the bookshelf. Memorial Day was real to her, to her dad, and to the family of the man that had placed his country before himself. 

While my girlfriend began writing her essay, I sat and thumbed through the war books that were on the bookshelf behind Uncle Arnie’s picture. I hadn’t suffered any personal loss because of war, but so many others have.

As I walked home, I thought about what to write. It was no longer a lame assignment, but the beginning of my awareness that war and freedom can cost some families everything they love. 

Photo credit: Casey Horner, Unsplash.com

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