Decoration Day

Maybe that’s what it was called when you were growing up. Maybe you or your family still call it that. Or maybe it’s your long weekend to celebrate the end of the school year/beginning of summer. If you grew up as a daughter of Mary Beth, this weekend marks the beginning of the opportunity to wear white pants and white shoes.

If you grew up as a child of Dale and Megan Duncan, with our den decorated in red, white, and blue and a mother who cried every time the national anthem was played, you had some kind of knowledge that Memorial Day was about honoring those we have lost in defense of our freedom. And after we experienced the death of Spencer, it has taken on an even deeper meaning.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m enjoying this long weekend. We have a long project list with not particularly cooperative weather, but women’s college softball is on. With the kids grown and none of them around this weekend, we won’t be firing up the grill, but we do have a hankering to order some pizza and put together my new bike. We will, as usual, watch the Kansas City Celebration at the Station as well as the PBS Memorial Day celebration.

It continues to baffle me how we can keep moving forward and enjoying life (have I mentioned we have a grandson?) and still continue to be devastated at the loss of Spencer. I say this all the time: This does not get easier, it just becomes more familiar. Still, there are times when it takes me to my knees to think about how long Spencer has been gone and that he is not coming home. But we do keep moving.

I won’t be the person who tells you to spend your Memorial Day dwelling on those who gave their lives for our freedom. That would be hypocritical of me since I plan to pull out the summer clothes and find those white sandals. But I will be the person who asks that you remember, in whatever way seems appropriate for you, that we live in freedom because others have sacrificed theirs.

A blessed Memorial Day to you and yours,
Megan Moore Duncan