Karen and I went to the eastern seaboard at the end of May and saw our nation's capital, me for the first time. We also saw Gettysburg, Shanksville and the Outer Banks. But the most poignant part of our visit was Washington, D.C.
While we were traveling, the Stanley Cup playoffs were in full swing, and as it turns out, my beloved Blackhawks won their third Cup in six years, much to my happy surprise. As is always the case in such circumstances, part of the tradition involves getting the names of players from the winning team engraved on the Cup itself. There's a byzantine process whereby the number of games played in the regular season or the number of games played in the Finals determines whose name is engrave for posterity on the Cup. It's a big deal. There are plenty of great players whose names are missing from that Cup. In terms of career honors, it's probably as big a deal, if not bigger, to have one's name on the Cup than it is to be elected to the Hall of Fame.
But the contrast with that competition hit me hard after I visited D.C. Although it's true that the players' names will be forever memorialized on the Cup (and in the Hall of Fame, where rings are kept to make room for later generations on the Cup itself), somehow it pales by comparison by the monuments I saw -- and witnessed -- during out trip:
Shanksville, Pennsylvania
Shanksville, Pennsylvania
The Vietnam Wall, D.C.
The Vietnam Wall, D.C.
Arlington National Cemetery
These images of graven reminders of men's ultimate sacrifices are far more powerful than the engravings on the side of the Cup. Sure, what the Blackhawks did this season was heroic, but only in a very, very, limited sense. The names that are engraved in Shanksville and D.C. are heroic in a much broader sense because these memorialize lives given for freedom and for the safety of others. The people whose names appear on these marble slabs represent the unlimited best that one man can do for others. The Blackhawks, triumphant as they were, would even admit this.
On this Independence Day, when threats to our security abound from ISIS, we should remember what those braves souls did back in the 1700's to set us on the course of the greatest human experiment ever. They faced grave danger themselves, although the names that we frequently associate with Independence Day largely survived unscathed. But it should not be forgotten that the names that appear on these marble and granite markers defended what the Founding Fathers set out to do. They repelled threats to our freedom that was so dearly bought.
Sadly, not every name that died in the cause of freedom is recorded. It's an impossible hope, of course, but a valiant effort was made to recognize those who made the ultimate sacrifice. So as not to be remiss, we should remember those whose final end still goes unanswered:
Although their names may be known only to God, the sacrifices they made are known to a grateful nation. A nation that still allows more freedom than any other country in the world.
May God bless the United States of America on its two hundred and thirty-ninth birthday.
(c) The Truxton Spangler Chronicles
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