The Cost Of The Memory And The Labor Of Remembering It

A Memorial Day post

It is Memorial Day. One week ago, I was flying home from the memorial service for an American bomber pilot who was unidentified from 1943 to 2022. In my post describing that service and the long-delayed funeral of an American hero, I said that the real work of remembering can finally begin.

What costs will I bear to remember him? Much of the free content on this wite is going behind a paywall. Weekly content will also be behind a paywall: book reviews for a month, essays forever. This labor is expensive and time consuming, and now it will need more of me than ever before. If you value the content here, please do consider buying a monthly or annual subscription. Otherwise, you will be missingthe best I have to offer you, and to offer John.

As it happens, I must return to Rochester airport and the town of North Rose, New York. I might even stay at the same amazing bed and breakfast at Bonnie Castle Farm. Sodus Bay is the heart of American apple country. Wayne County is covered in orchards and the townships are bustling with business. John was a product of this all-American setting. He was everything small-town America imagined itself to be, when he went to war, and now the town will remember him.

It will happen through the auspices of mural painter I met at the memorial for John. He needed a guide to the historiography of Operation Tidal Wave. Now he has graciously asked me to be an advisor on his mural project. I cannot refuse. He also says, repeatedly, that my uncle John’s story will be a feature film someday. Perhaps he is right. Perhaps I should write one. Perhaps I shall.

Maybe you follow me on other websites or social media channels and want to support me, but you aren’t particularly interested in military history, even if you are interested in my work. So here is a great way to support me, and to support my military history work, as well as my work remembering uncle John.

You can buy a subscription for someone you love, who loves to read about war and conflict, for Memorial Day. Or just click the donation button below, and thank you. It means everything to me — and it will come to mean everything for a whole family.