Vicksburg

I went to another wedding this weekend. This was my first wedding that I went to alone, besides the ones that I've been in, which those don't really count anyway because I'm too busy doing damage control in those. :) I had to face head-on my fear of this. It wasn't so bad. It was actually empowering. I need to start doing more things alone. I still don't think I could sit at a non-fast food restaurant alone and eat, but maybe this year I can conquer that.

Anyway, I have this goal of visiting all the Civil War battlefields. Europe is exciting, and I love it, too, but it is important to discover America as well. There's a lot in our backyard. Nonetheless, I drove through the Vickburg battlefields today. At the Grand Canyon, driving through Arizona, and various other places when I have had time to think, I have been having these moments lately. I had another one today. I was waiting for the next film to start in the museum there before I drove through the battlefield, and there was this side room with talking. It was diaries or memoirs being read, and there were corresponding exhibits. Over all the talking, and through soaking in the words being spoken by a woman's voice at this point, there is constant gunfire noises. I stood there rooted in the floor. I almost expected the manekin holding the gun in the trench set-up to turn around and look me in the eyes, I couldn't believe the words being spoken. The woman, obviously going through the siege of Vicksburg, the sickness, the starvation, the gunfire, and other hardships was talking about every bit of creation praising God, including her.

And then it hit me. She was giving thanks in the midst of a WAR!!! I turned and looked at this net exhibit. I looked around. I was the only person in the room. But I hope I remember that moment for the rest of my life. More touching than some of the other things I saw that day, I want those words to reverburate in my heart and mind.

Despite everything that has been going on, I have so much to be thankful for, and yet do I give thanks enough? No. It is so much easier to think about the bad things than to pull out the good things, dust them off, and put them on display to reflect upon. Most everything I have faced in the past few years has been an inner battle, not an outer one. I have never had to deal with my country being torn apart. I don't wake up to gunfire and wonder if it will be my last morning to do so. I don't have soldiers ransacking my house. Times have been hard, but I never had to retreat into a cave like many did at that time in Vicksburg. If they could give thanks during that time, how much more thanks could I offer up on a daily basis? A lot more.

I also thought about how I've never had to fight for the freedoms I enjoy in America. True, there have been some infringement upon those freedoms in the past six years, but the foundations are still there. I've never had to face war in my homeland. I don't have to deal with what Bjorn and others are facing as I write this. I'm thankful for the military.

Back to the Civil War and not the current one, right or wrong, those men have passion. They had passion enough to die for what they believed, and I truly admire that. I thought about myself, and although I'm attracted to that passion and drive, do I have that? I honestly don't know if I have anything I believe so strongly that I could willingly put my life in danger like those men that were often younger than I am now. Wow. Let that sink in.

So when I go to a cementary or memorial, I try to take some time to reflect about a person or a group of people there or represented there. Today Lt. Col. Charles Turner's name jumped out at me. I don't know who he was. I don't know what side he was on. I just know he was on the left side of the road I was driving along, but his name was there. However, I know that there were a lot more men that died there that did not have their names on this special cement thing. So, I reflected on those men there, the men that never got to the rank of Lt. Col. or anything because they perished right there, the young men that gave it all, the guys that never lived to see the end of the war.

I thought about their families. I thought that many of them were fathers. Were there descendants proud? Did they even know? I hope they are remembered.

I have more to say, but I feel like this has gotten long enough. I thought more about the concept of home today. That will be the next topic, I believe.