Today was the first time I have attended a Memorial Day commemoration on the Mendocino Coast. Regardless of your politics, it’s sobering to see the headstones of men and women who have sacrificed for our country. The numbers are small — less than a 100 — but no less important to those who have lost loved ones.
The ceremony at Rose Cemetery in Fort Bragg lasted about 15 minutes in all. The head of the local VFW post urged people to remember this day not as a “day off from work”, but as something more sober, especially as the living veterans of the World War I & II, rapidly dwindle. “We need to remind people why we celebrate this day.”
Poems were read — one about a Gold Star Mother, now a 90-year-old woman who lost her son in World War II. Taps was played and a 21-gun salute sounded.
Two red wreaths were placed near the flag pole in the middle of a rather tiny plot that includes a half dozen Union Soldiers who manned Fort Bragg in the 1850’s and 60’s.
A contingent of U.S. Coast Guard soldiers from Noyo Harbor prepared the site this week for the celebration, cleaning and bleaching each headstone to something close to the orginal bright white. A flag was placed at each grave.
A few hours later, I was walking in Mendocino Village near the city’s historic cemetery and noticed another 100 or so flags. I was a bit surprised at the number. It seems that even in our rather remote rural area — and no doubt similar rural areas across America — there is no escape from the sad toll of war.
