Lest We Forget.

Today (April 25) is ANZAC Day. It’s a public holiday we experience as a nation in order to remember and recognise the sacrifices made by the Australian & New Zealand Army Corps; to commemorate all armed forces past and present, with particular focus on the devastating campaign at Anzac Cove in Gallipoli, Turkey. There are dawn services and remembrance ceremonies that happen nationwide and overseas. It is an annual occasion that is imbued with solemnity, empathy and respect. Next year begins the ANZAC Centenary; one hundred years since our nation joined WWI.  

I view broadcasts of various services and experience a range of diverse emotions as serving personnel (past and present), descendants, dignitaries and other participants march, speak, sing, play, watch… Diary excerpts recited aloud give me goose bumps; evocative fragments that attempt to convey some of the horrors experienced in wartime. The Ode puts a lump in my throat. The Last Post brings me to tears. And yet, these services also display the thousands and thousands of people in attendance, the constant applause throughout the March, little children with pictures of long-gone-relatives, the proud but grim smiles of those being acknowledged. I recall the stories I have been told by my Mother and other family members of brave young men and women from whom I descend; some returned and some did not. Others were taken from us before I was old enough to truly know them or converse properly and I mourn the loss heavily. 

"They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them." {The Ode, from For the Fallen, by Laurence Binyon}

Most powerfully, though, I always find myself struck by the dichotomy of this day. We pause in sadness but also in hope. We recall devastating losses at the hands of our enemies but stand in solemn unity with them now as allies. War casts a black cloud over our embattled past but shines a guiding light on a peaceful future. My heart is filled with gratitude at the sacrifices made for our nation but unburdened by the inconceivable fear, suffering and loss that stalked our nation in wartime. I have only ever known what it is to be free. I was born into the greatest country in the world; a birthright secured for me and countless others by courageous Australians who fought and died in senseless, wasteful, brutal and desolate circumstances. They were like me; they had people who loved them and who they loved in return, places they longed to visit, passions to follow and ambitions to strive towards. I sit here typing away, comfortable, healthy, fortunate and free, aware as always but especially on days like today, that their sacrifice is immeasurable and can never be repaid. I can only hope that in the next one hundred years these days of dignified recognition and heartfelt remembrance continue, the significance never diminishing; that our nation always values the freedom that came at such a high cost.