A Weekend of Remembrance:
Atoka Volunteers Overcome Hurdles to Honor Fallen Heroes
Hello Atoka! To all of you, I hope that you had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend and that you remembered in your hearts that the true meaning of this holiday was to honor and respect those who gave the ultimate sacrifice to ensure that we all enjoy the freedom that we are so fortunate to have.
Also, please continue to remember all those who are silently and selfishly standing sentinel for all of us as we go about our daily lives. God Bless our soldiers!
I would like to take this time to explain something which may be bothering some of you who noticed something that happened in our county cemeteries. We, as a county, are extremely blessed to have so many people who volunteer to place flags on the final resting place of our local veterans.
Our veteran's organization has its monthly breakfast to help in purchasing these flags and we help the local communities procure these flags for placement. For those of you who do not know, there are twenty-five different cemeteries in our county and the local people and organization work diligently to ensure that our fallen heroes are not forgotten and are remembered by having an American flag placed at their final resting place.
This year, due to shipping issues and order placement, we did not receive all the flags for every cemetery in our county. The shipment of needed flags arrived as late as Saturday of this week, and we scrambled to contact our local volunteers and communities to ensure that we could get flags to the people needed for placement.
The only cemetery that we could not cover at this time was the Green Meadows Cemetery which is located by Atoka Airport. We have ordered the flags for this location, but they will not come until after Memorial Day and we are truly apologetic about this oversight. I assure you; I will ensure that every veteran interred there will have a flag placed on his/her resting place once we have procured the needed flag.
It was unfortunate that this occurred, and we will strive to work hard to ensure that this does not happen again!
Saturday, Renee', Cheyenne, and I made our journey to our family's cemeteries to place flowers on the graves of passed family members and to also place flags on the final resting place of veterans in the Mount Olive Cemetery and on the graves of our family members who served in the military. While we were at the Mount Olive Cemetery, we divided with each one of us taking a third of the cemetery and placing flags on veterans' resting place.
I was talking to Cheyenne after I completed my search asking him about a veteran I thought he had missed. Upon checking, I pointed out to him that a particular gravesite belonged to a person/friend that I had served with but had no military designator. I also showed him two more gravesites that had been overlooked but was corrected by having flags placed in honor/remembrance for their service.
We talked about different service members who had had medals bestowed upon them for their service and the career of one member who had served in three different wars: World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. Both of us were deeply humbled by the sacrifice and service displayed and honored that we could demonstrate our admiration and acknowledgement for all those who gave their all for our freedoms.
Renee' told me that she had been informed by a local citizen that Benny Lewis, a soldier from the Vietnam War, never had a flag placed on his gravesite and was upset about this oversight. We were quite shocked about this, and we said that we would ensure that he was remembered and that a flag would be placed on his grave this year for sure.
We made our next stop at the Green Meadows Cemetery and placed flowers on graves of family members interred there and placed a flag on an uncle's grave who had served in the army. We walked down row B of the cemetery and were able to locate the resting place of Benny Lewis and placed a flag on his grave telling Cheyenne his story as we knew it.
I was thankful that we found it and could rest easy that we had fulfilled a promise to acknowledge our gratitude and fulfill a promise that he would have a veteran's flag in remembrance of his service and sacrifice.
We made our way back to my truck and were surprised by a pair of killdeer who attempted to lure us away from their camouflaged nest. I was attempting to correct a flag holder when Renee' shouted a warning to me that the mother killdeer was about to attack me. I looked up, saw her charging me, and began my retreat from her guarded territory.
I looked down and there, nestled on the ground, was her nest with four tiny chicks concealed and perfectly hidden from prying eyes. I backed away with mother and father killdeer visibly relieved and immediately covering baby chicks and luring me away from the area. I explained their behavior to Cheyenne as he was unfamiliar with their parental antics and laughing that the small creatures were going to attack me.
We drove from the cemetery and saw the American Flags adorning the fence along the cemetery. We all felt a sense of wistfulness as we left because we could not place flags on the final resting place of all the veterans interred there but we were able to complete the tasks that we were able to.
I enjoyed the time I could spend with my family on such outings, the memories we made, the sharing of history, honoring those who have sacrificed for all of us, the simple experience of enjoying nature's unexpected surprises.
I hope that you always remember and think about all that you have, the freedoms that you enjoy, and are forever grateful that someone cared enough to sacrifice themselves so that we can have the life that we currently enjoy.
The United States of America is THE greatest country in the world and is truly the land of opportunities. May we always be blessed to have what we have and continue to do better.
