Memorial Day meaning pondered around area

All of the men and women currently serving in the United States military are veterans in the making, and America's ongoing military presence in Iraq has served as a reminder to many of sacrifice.

Memorial Day, a day for honoring such sacrifice, is Monday and Southeast Missouri residents have mixed feelings about how the most recent war impacts the holiday.

For many, it's just another day.

Josh Heisserer of Cape Girardeau said he is not sure. "I wasn't for the war anyway," he said, explaining that no one in his family has been active in the armed forces. "We've always had a family picnic, but we've not been that sentimentally attached."

Octavious Moore of Cape Girardeau expects people will be more sensitive to the day.

"Memorial Day has always been a day to go out with my family, go to the park and barbecue," he said. "I feel like I need to start looking at it like this is the day that you might not be able to see every day, taking advantage of it."

George Suggs, a retired professor of history, said he feels no different.

"Memorial Day is for all veterans, and I've lived long enough to know that there have been some horrendous wars in the past," he said.

Brein Salazar of Perryville, Mo., said she won't be celebrating the day, although she emphasized that she still respects what it means.

"I know it sounds unpatriotic, but it hasn't really affected me on a personal level. I haven't had any relatives who've served in any wars."

Junior high school student Ni Hoang of Sikeston, Mo., said the holiday will revolve around her family's activities. "When I'm with my family, we feel safe, like nothing's going on," she said.

Renee Miller of Cape Girardeau said she has been too busy working to think about it.

"I've seen a lot of change in everybody else," she said, "but in myself, I haven't paid much attention to it or other holidays."

Lan Coots of Advance, Mo., served in the U.S. military but never went to war.

"It makes me more conscious of the previous times of sacrifice for what we have today."

Fred Dock of Sikeston is a veteran of the Vietnam War, and he was the only one of four brothers old enough to go to war, taking their place. "If you're a veteran, you're conscious of it every day."

Bud Dock, Fred Dock's younger brother, said he hopes everyone would understand one thing about the holiday: "Memorial Day is honoring our vets in the past, and to me it's the ones who've passed on. Instead of going boating and to picnics, it should be going to the cemeteries."

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