Honor Flight #19

Last month I had the opportunity to accompany my uncle on Honor Flight #19. This is a nationwide nonprofit organization dedicated to honoring our veterans by taking them on an expense free trip to visit our nation’s memorials. Every veteran must be accompanied by what they call a “guardian” to help them on the trip, which was how I was able to join.

We had much on the agenda, which started at Arlington National Cemetery where we got to see the Changing of the Guard and where some of the veterans participated in a wreath laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We then visited the Air Force Memorial and followed that by the US Marine Corps War Memorial, the World War II Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Korean War Veterans Memorial, the FDR Memorial, and lastly on the following day, we got to visit Fort McHenry—the home of the Star-Spangled Banner. The last one is such a historic place. Walking through the fort seeing the cannons, the quarters, the flag pole, and the overlooking sea, I easily sensed what took place that day. The battle happened over two hundred years ago and the fort has been inactive since World War II, but the spirit of all those people will always be embedded.

We were constantly on the move but seeing these sites back-to-back allow you to fully grasp the magnitude of how many men and women made the ultimate sacrifice for our country—so many headstones at Arlington, so many stars at the World War II Memorial with each star representing one hundred dead or missing service personnel, so many names on the Korean Memorial, so many names on the Vietnam Memorial—so many that from afar they seem like merely a decorative pattern yet up close they represent individual people who each had a life of their own much like myself. That day was a stark reminder of how grateful I am to be living here and for the life I have.

The most fulfilling part of the trip was all the people I met. I got to meet many veterans and many other guardians. And I got to learn a little bit about each of them. I got to meet many of the Honor Flight staff members who all showed such passion for what they were doing. It’s a passion that’s driven by a sense of gratitude and wanting to give back. They are remarkable people. And lastly, our group was greeted every time we were at the airport—both LAX and BWI—by so many people thanking the veterans for their service. That was truly amazing. I overheard one veteran telling his son how different this was compared to what he received returning from Vietnam. He was deeply affected. It summed up the point of the trip.