Remembering Uncle Joe once again this Veterans Day

The night before my Uncle Joe O'Donnell left for Korea, he and my Aunt Marie stayed up all night talking. They wanted to spend every possible moment together, as they knew there was a possibility that Joe might not return.  The trip to La Guardia airport the next day was solemn and somber. We were all so terribly sad.  I was only 6 and 1/2 years old at the time, but until this day, whenever I pass the airport, I still feel the blanket of sorrow that covered us, Joe's family, as we hugged and said our final good-byes.
When Joe arrived in Korea, he had no way of getting to his post.  Since there was a desperate need for officers at the front, Joe arranged to share a jeep with an Army Chaplin, the Rev. James Meeder.
During their quiet ride together, Joe told Father many family stories about his wife and two little girls and spoke unabashedly of his tremendous love for them.  The next day, Joe shared in Mass and Holy Communion with Father Meeder and the rest of his platoon before leaving for the front.
Even though he was a strong and brave young man, my Uncle Joe was not what I envisioned as a warrior.  Although he had served his country for three and a half years during World War II as a member of the 325th Glider Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division, and had fought and survived the horrors of the Battle of the Bulge, when I think of Uncle Joe, I remember a kind, sensitive and unusually gentle man.
I remember a man who drew pictures in his letters home so his two little girls would get some idea of the people and places their Daddy was seeing.  I think of a devoted son - a son who composed an original poem for his mother one Mother's Day, adding a note of apology at the end because he wasn't able to get to a store to buy a "real" Mother's Day card.  I have no doubt this poem meant more to my grandmother than all the most expensive store-bought cards she ever received.
On October 13, 1951, 1st Lieutenant Joseph T. O'Donnell was killed in action while leading his men, soldiers of the 38th Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, up a hill called Heartbreak Ridge.   On the day the news of Joe's death reached us at our home in Brooklyn, my Grandma - a reserved and ladylike woman - ran out in the street screaming, attempting in vain to run away from the most horrendous news any mother could ever receive.  My Grandma had six children, but Joe was her only son, and he was just 29 years old.
I remember the bitter cold day in January when we brought Joe's body to its final resting place.  The six year girl in me can hear the loud and frightening 21 Gun salute, and the final, mournful sound of a bugle playing taps. But most of all, I still feel the sadness on my Aunt Marie's face as this 26 year old mother of two was handed the folded flag of a grateful nation.
Now, many years later, I walk up State Street and pass a memorial to another forgotten war, Vietnam.  There on the silent, dark monuments are the names written in bronze, too numerous for me to count.  I slow my steps and purposely allow my eyes to fall reverently on the names of the young Americans who gave their lives in service to our country.  I offer a silent prayer for them and for their families.  I learned at an early age the pain and sadness that lingers forever when one so young, one so beloved falls on a battlefield.    And, it causes me to think these thoughts once again.  May we continue to remember them.  May we never look lightly on war and may we work feverishly, unrelentingly to maintain the freedom and peace they died to preserve.