To the editor,

There is a ritual of remembrance that surrounds the last survivor of a war. The survivors of war or any great event provide a living thread that lets us more easily enter the stories of the past. 

There is something about history being told by someone who was actually there that brings us more readily back in time, giving us a true glimpse of who we once were. Their young souls witnessed some of the difficult truths that emerge from battle.

History is like riding a horse or learning French. If you don’t do it young, it’s hard to get the trick of it later. When I was young, I remembered the sound of conversations, if not the content, something you did until you started your life as a grownup. I now sleep on a bed made of their voices.

Looking ahead on this past Victory Day, our nation is about 20 years away from recognizing the last few veterans of World War II. There are about 2 million American veterans from the war still alive. This count is dwindling fast, with hundreds of these older vets dying every day. Every Goliath has its David. It is one minute to midnight, if not 30 seconds to midnight, to unpack the memories that were formed. They shudder in the wind like the last leaf on a dying tree.

Scarred by their wars, they stayed silent for decades. Whatever home means to us, they helped us find it. They sit quietly, whispering stories of a distant past and speaking to the earliest days of history. They are the siren, and their stories like a gentle hand guiding us to know more.

Time stands still in Europe, unlike here in the United States where we live in the moment. These 90-year-old men are not old in Europe; they are teenagers who liberated a village, town or city. They are still boys, and people cry to see them again. The veterans cry, too. We don’t live in a diverse world. We live in bubbles that touch.

The point of all this is to remember these aging men — and not just on Victory Day. Do not look at them as hard of hearing, maybe a bit bent over, perhaps walking with a cane. Look at them the way others do in far-off places — as young men, liberators, warriors; men who did heroic things just because it was what they had to do to get back home to their loved ones. Many never did. They are the portrait in the room whose eyes follow you wherever you may be.

Thank you to all our veterans. Temper Fi!

Ronald Raposa
16 Rosita Ave.