Sacrifice in white.

I have visited veteran's cemeteries.  Some where there are acres of strangers buried under white crosses.  One that has the best views one could want for your loved ones.  Ones that contain people I love.  None of them are easy to visit.

As I walk among the graves and those white stones, I think about the people under them.  Who misses them?  Who did they leave behind?  Who still comes here and speaks to them?  Who touches the stones and reads their names out loud?

The last thing I think about is the religious indication on the stone.  It means nothing to me.  

What does mean something to me is the person laying under that stone.  They went to war for their country, some willing some drafted.  But all went.  And whether they died in battle, or later from the struggles they could not leave behind, or from old age many years after their service, they all served.

I watched the DNC a couple of weeks ago, I cried with Mr. Khan and his wife over the loss of their beloved son and I agreed with his statement about sacrifice.

But it did start me thinking about that sacrifice, the sacrifice of losing your loved one while they serve our country.  OUR country.  Ours.

Who running for the highest office in our country has made this sacrifice?  Who in this particular election has even served or has a family member that has served?

Certainly not Mr. Trump who used deferment a number of times to get out of serving OUR country.  My brother did serve and he was one of the ones that could not leave his struggles behind and lost his battles.  

Certainly not his privileged children that had a choice to serve or not and choose not to.

But also not Hillary Clinton nor her child.

My family has always served.  Grandfathers, uncles, father, brothers, cousins, nephews and I am proud of each and every one of them and grateful.  I look back and wish I had served, but because I was a girl, it was not expected of me.

Perhaps it should be expected of all of us.  Perhaps is we had mandatory service and more people actually faced losing a loved one that would be under one of these white monuments some day, they might not be so willing to drop a bomb or send young people to foreign lands to perhaps never come home.  Perhaps if everyone in OUR country faced this possibility it would no longer be a possibility?