We will not forget them

I've just got back from the Dawn Parade for ANZAC day. It was beautiful and moving. Both my grandfathers and the great grandfather I knew fought in the wars. They were all heroes who were decorated. I'm saddened that I don't know more about what they achieved, but I'm sure they wouldn't have talked about it, even if I had been old enough to understand. At the parade I noticed that there weren't very many of the "old boys" left. I was heartened though, to see so many people of my age or younger, with young families, there to show their respects and remember that those men who died did so for something greater than themselves, the dream of peace.

I, and I'm sure most of my friends, can't imagine what it must have been like to travel halfway round the world, to place yourself in mortal peril, to see friends die, to be wounded, to kill. My great grandfather was in WW1, what must the trenches have been like for him. How did my great grandmother cope? Was she in fear of that telegram everyday? My Pop, who died when I was eight, he never talked about the war, but he had many medals. He was a wonderful man, but what horrors did he see? On this day more than any other of the year I feel linked to those brave men who came before me, and their wives who stayed behind. Without experiencing it ourselves we will never fully understand what it was they did for this country and the Commonwealth. They will always be in my heart and I am extremely proud to be of their blood.