After The Silence

     On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the guns fell silent all across Europe.  After years of war, after the ruin of a vast swath of France, the Great War was over and the soldiers and sailors could come home from the horrors of war.

     In the United States, this day now honors all veterans of all wars.  It offers a chance to thank the living.  War is indeed dreadful, abhorrent; and most dreadful of all is the price it exacts from those who must fight.  One day a year is the tiniest of respects to pay.