It is hard to describe. It took me quite a long time since we have been back to fully comprehend it all. You see the green grass, the flag pole, the American flag snapping some times and quietly waving other times depending on the wind, you see the rows and rows and rows and rows of cemetery markers. You know you are in Normandy. You know you are at the American cemetery of the brave soldiers who died during that D Night and D Day invasion, but it still took me a while to fully understand what I was witnessing. Yes, I had walked through sacred grounds before. Yes, I had prayed for the fallen and loved ones. Yes, I knew the loss of life, dreams, hopes and plans but…only after walking the rows and standing before the graves to honor these heroes, did it start to sink in and then slowly form on my return to the States. It was a cemetery, graves, stones, shattered dreams of kids. It was a cemetery full of young people. I had never done that before. Other such places were mixed. Young ,old and aged. But here…. all young people. 19, 20,21 and variations on those numbers, with some exceptions but still much younger than the usual cemeteries.
We walked through a graveyard of the young. The fallen. Row after row of youth lost in the battle. Isn't that how it always is. Whether World War II or Korea or Vietnam or Iraq or Afganistan or… name the conflict …it is the youth. But here it was visible in one setting. A graveyard of youth.
Maybe that is why it is so painful to wander that space. They were crying for their mothers as they died.
Never forget. On a pseudo bad day in your days, think back to this place.
Live loud and bold.
Remember the fallen youth at Normandy and give a thank you to the soldiers wherever they are today, in any far away conflict and pray for them and their moms and dads, husbands and wives and families.
All was quiet the day we wandered this cemetery. The stillness was shattering. But you could feel the wishes of the kids laying there saying please remember me and my dreams. Live your life as I could not live mine. Don't waste a moment. They did not and would not.
An ageless experiment indeed.