The Magical Why

Grandpa Young's signup for WWI. 

From Grandpa Coffey's jacket, which hangs in my closet.

Curiosity.  Kids have it in spades, to the point of driving parents crazy. 
 
But it’s something I’ve started to really embrace and encourage in myself and my kids. When I indulge my curiosity, life gets more colorful: desires become more clear, long-forgotten wounds resurface;  joys and fears equally exposed.
 
My kids had Wednesday, Veterans' Day, off school.
Naturally they ask why.
 
“To thank all the men and women who serve our country,” I reply.
 
“Why today?” 
 
I am about to spout “because on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, World War I ended in 1918.  This being “the war to end all wars”, we honor it by…” I stop.  By what?  We honor the end of war by honoring those who prepare to fight it?
 
This is like that time when, at the end of my 3 month gluten-free, sugar-free stint, I vowed to stop gluten and sugar forever…
When I eventually had that delicious piece of chocolate cake, I didn’t pretend to celebrate that vow every year, and especially not with cake. 
 
So what’s up Armistice/Veterans' Day?
 
Turns out President Dwight D. Eisenhower didn’t get it either.
 
He signed a bill in 1954 changing Armistice Day to Veterans' Day in acknowledgement that they really have nothing to do with each other.
 
Furthermore, in 1968, with Viet Nam turning sour, and many questioning why we’re in this war that is generating a huge crop of veterans, Veterans’ Day was officially moved to a Monday in October.  
 
The government decided to give Americans four guaranteed three-day weekends every year: Washington’s birthday, Memorial Day, Columbus Day and Veterans' Day.
 
When have Americans been known to complain about a guaranteed three-day weekend?
 
Umm…at this point.   They complained. And loudly.
 
We the people don’t like change.
 
While change is inevitable, and only growth optional, we still resist change - even those tiny changes that could delight us (annual three-day weekend anyone?)
 
So Gerald Ford, that president of oh-so-many glamorous tasks (anyone else want to pardon Nixon?) canceled the guaranteed three-day weekend and signed a bill that moved Veterans' Day back to the now defunct and still confusing Armistice Day: 11/11.
 
And as for veterans, Ike remains a hero for the ages.  In fact, even despite his failure to stop McCarthyism, I would vote for this Republican president any Tuesday in November.
 
Looking back, when Ike’s vice-president lost the election, he had gracious words for the new president:  “Like every other citizen, I wish the new president, and all who labor with him, Godspeed.”  Classy. Unifying. 
 
Ike also sponsored and signed the Civil Rights Bill of 1957 and balanced the budget three times during his eight years.  Three times. 
 
Most astonishingly, he kept the peace during the Cold War, ending the Korean War once he took office. 
 
As a five-star general who oversaw one of the most spectacular military landings in history, his final act was to warn AGAINST the Industrial Military Complex…
 
Mic drop. Who else could get away with this?
 
He spoke of a balance: “We recognize the imperative need for this  (standing military). Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications.” 
 
He described these implications in his Cross of Iron Speech:
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.
This world in arms is not spending money alone. 
It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. 
The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population.
It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some 50 miles of concrete highway. 
We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. 
We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. 
This, I repeat, is the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking. 
This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. 

He speaks of a beautiful and fragile balance.  To not have a standing military is as foolish in the 21st century as having one so large our society hangs from a cross of iron to pay for it...

With every balance, it’s the questions that help retain equilibrium:
Is this invasion really justified? Is military force our only option? How can we best help our veterans transition into civilian life? What skills can we give them? Why do more than 6,000 veterans continue to die by suicide every year? How are the 182 veterans who ran for Congress this year planning to make things better?

It’s up to us to ask questions and not stop until we get answers or get better questions.  Curiosity.  It is...magical. 

Merlin, the sorcerer from T.H.White’s The Once and Future King, (published when Ike was president), says it best:
 “The best thing for being sad," replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, "is to learn something. That's the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the only thing for you. Look what a lot of things there are to learn.”