November 11 is Veterans Day in the US. After recovering from the effects of the big celebration of the Marine Corps birthday on Nov 10, I always pause to reflect on the many men and women who gave their lives in the service of our country.
This is an image I took a few years back at the American Cemetery above Omaha Beach in Normandy: http://dan-matyola.squarespace.com/danmatyolas-pesos/2021/11/10/normandy K-5 IIs, smc DA 18-135mm F/3.5-5.6 ED AL (IF) DC WR Lens The cemetery is one of the most moving and inspirational places I have ever visited. 9,388 American service men and women are buried there, most of whom died on or shortly after D-Day. Among them are two of the Niland brothers, whose story inspired Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan," General Theodore Roosevelt Jr., a Medal of Honor recipient, and Quentin Roosevelt <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quentin_Roosevelt>, an aviator killed in action in World War I and reburied next to his brother. There is an excellent museum next to the cemetery, which is very informative. They have a database of all Americans who died in WW II and are buried in Europe, which allowed me to find the second image, of my Uncle Peter Matyola's grave in the American Cemetery in Margraten, Netherlands. Peter was my father's youngest brother, and his favorite among 9 siblings. The entire family considered him the smartest, best looking and most personable, and he was the light of my Babushka's life. He was a young aviation cadet in 1944, but as the war drew to its climax, the flight school was closed, he was made a machine gunner in the infantry, and died shortly after arriving in Belgium.. On behalf of my late father, I recite the old Slavonic requiem hymn: *Vicnaja pamjat, * *Vicnaja pamjat. * *Blazennyj pokoj; vicnaja pamjat.* *Eternal Memory!* *Eternal Memory!* *Blessed Repose, Eternal memory.* Dan Matyola *https://tinyurl.com/DJM-Pentax-Gallery <https://tinyurl.com/DJM-Pentax-Gallery>* -- %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected] to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
