Veterans Day. A day to dedicate veterans, all veterans from all wars, peace time veterans, living or dead. In 1918, on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, an armistice, or temporary cessation of hostilities. It was called Armistice Day and became a federal holiday in 1938. After World War II it became known as Veterans Day. When I was young, I remember the little red paper poppies many wore to commemorate the day. You do not see them very often these days.

There are many traditions that take place for Veterans Day. One is the official wreath-laying ceremony held each Veterans Day at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery. Many cities have parades on this day for veterans. Denver has a parade Saturday at 9:00 am at City Park. Veterans Day can be confused with Memorial Day celebrated in May. That day is in memory of military members who lost their lives in the service of their country. Veterans Day is for all veterans, living and dead.

Since I am a Viet Nam Era veteran, I have military memories. I was drafted in 1964. Therefore, my service experience was a duty not of my choice. At that time around forty percent of the military were draftees. The day I was inducted there were seven others. We took a night train trip to St. Louis Missouri and then a bus to Fort Leonard Missouri for basic training. That train trip was a milk, mail run and it stopped at every small town to pick up the mail and milk. I didn’t get much sleep that night. During the eight weeks of eye-opening basic training, we were told that we would all be going to Viet Nam. However, for some reason I will never know, I was assigned to go to Germany. Therefore, I did not have to experience the pain and violence of war experience.