The Ignorance of Bliss

Today is November 11th. Remembrance day.

Have you ever asked yourself what beliefs would you risk your life for? If you are like me, raised in a time when anti-war sentiments were the vogue and all forms of engagement were frowned upon and you lived in a country where we had the luxury of deciding whether or not we wanted to be involved in such things, the answer would probably be, "Not too much."

Sure, if someone came in through my window and wanted my t.v. or my stereo or to stick a knife in me while I slept, I'd put up a fight. But as a young man, living in Canada I have very rarely ever been taken to task on this. The older I get the more I realize, especially in today's global environment that the luxuries we have, are rare and more, those luxuries were the gift of generations of men and women who knew that they could and would fight to allow me those comforts.

As a parent I don't ever want my child to suffer at the hands of another, I want her to have the same level of security that I was so blissfully unaware of, all the while I rattle on about the senselessness of war. Senseless, it may be, but the fact is it happens. The other fact is, there are people, unlike me, who have served in our armed forces for years, for generations to protect my innocence and my ignorance.

Today is not about the glories of war or about victory over adversity, it is simply an opportunity, I would say responsibility, to think about the people who have given up there lives, whether you asked them to or not, so that we might have the option to grow and raise our own in peace and ignorance. To allow them the chance to remember the friends and family they lost, people who could answer in the affirmative, "I would risk my own life for my family, my friends, my way of life and my country."

I will express my gratitude to them, today, because they chose to do what I could not.