Let Us Make Memorial Days History

"I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, "Mother, what was war?" Eve Merriam

Seven years of my life were spent in the former Soviet Union. Kiev in the Ukraine to be exact.

I got there several years after Brezhnev's death, several month's before Andropov did the same and on time to witness the launch of "glasnost and perestroika" by Gorbachev.

All through those years, there was a constant diet of war talk. There were the parades celebrating the past "glories," the television programmes reliving the campaigns against the "imperialist," Hitler and everyone in between. Old men, veterans gathered each day on park benches to regal anyone who would listen of their storming of some distant shore. With more medals on their breasts than teeth in some of their mouths, the stories of hunger, death and destruction terrified rather than inspired me.

Coming from a small island nation, far removed from the wars in Europe, it was hard for me to relate. The closest Jamaica ever came to physically witnessing the attack of the agency of one nation on another country would have been The Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. I was not born yet to have experienced any impact that it may have had on our island. The next such incident would be the invasion of Grenada by the United States in 1983.

The late Maurice Bishop (Jamaica Observer image)

The news of this latter invasion and the murder of Maurice Bishop devastated me. I was a student in the former Soviet Union, recently arrived, when I heard. It was days before my raging anger subsided, spurred by the anti-American rhetoric of my hosts. Decades later and I still recall the late Bishop with fondness and some amount of pride related to his tenacity to lead his country along a more self-reliant path.

The anger towards, mistrust and hate of one people towards another, however, has no resting place in me.

Many have given their lives across the world, on one side of the fence or the other battling in "defense" and in service of their countries. I join those paying homage to fallen soldiers from the United States and indeed across the world today.

Yet, I remain a contemporary pacifist.

"The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war that we know about peace, more about killing that we know about living." Omar Bradley

War and violence, much the same as Love and respect breed their own. I am one who would rather have love babies.

Anyone who has been in a relationship with me will tell you that I will stay up two days straight and talk things through. Violent, malicious and hate-filled actions will never come from me.

Maybe there is a hippie in me as in our Guest Author +Karen Jeanette. Love to me is always the answer. Whether that means we are going to try and resolve our differences or go our separate ways, my preferred platform for that decision is a loving one.

I am not naïve to believe that nations can always join hands and sing Kumbaya to solve their differences. Something and hindsight tell me, however, that it is the way we start the "relating" that determines how it evolves. Let us therefore listen more keenly and hear more deeply what each other has to say.

"War does not determine who is right — only who is left." Bertrand Russel

One of the many reasons that I am proud to say "I am Canadian," is due to this country's proud history of peacekeeping. May that never change.

I look forward to the day when we will spend way more valuing lives rather than shedding tears at war memorials. Until that day comes, let each of us in our small corner shine the Light of Love, Peace, Respect and Mutual Understanding.

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Have a peace-filled day. Namaste