A Memorial Day Prayer Saluting Those Who Sacrifice And Why

There were a handful of churches, a temple, a couple of schools, and upwards of 600 or so families, some of whose "boys" were shipping off to Viet Nam.

It was the mid-1960s, in one of the farther-out bucolic New York City bedroom communities. It had no legal status as a local jurisdiction beyond the zip code, but the Census called it a hamlet. It had a smart, centrally prominent fire house, and a volunteer fire department made up of our schoolmates' dads and uncles, some of whom cut our hair, or owned the hardware store or deli or general store, or held out the collection basket at church, or worked on the road department, or coached a Little League team, or were our dentist, or plumber. We knew them; they knew at least our last names (there were too many of us brothers to remember all the first names).

And on Memorial Day, some of them donned the dress uniforms of their highest rank of military service and stood with us Cub Scouts, and it was sometimes their boys heading out to boot camp and getting deployed when and if their time came. Girl Scouts, Brownies, Boy Scouts ... we'd line up in ranks in the parking lot behind the firehouse. The sun would get hot, and our polished shoes would catch the light, and our unblemished blue uniforms, and perfectly pressed and folded neckerchiefs clasped neatly with a slide, all just-so. It meant we'd prepared for the moment the band would strike up and our shoulders would square and backs would straighten. And the march would begin. Each step in unison carried up from the ground into the pit of our stomachs and a throb in our chests.

We were that kid. We stood at the Lawrence Circle flag at half-mast, near the Civil War cannon and  plaque that listed in weathered bronze the names of those who'd served and died to patch back together a Union. Standing at attention, the physicality of stillness and utter quiet taught a child's soul reverence, honor, respect, and thanks for those who'd sacrificed so much for others, for me.  A 21-gun salute shattered the noon silence.

A moment of small-town, first-name-basis pomp fixed a forever memory, a piece of meaning, a part of who that kid became that he was not a day earlier.

And the moment became an answer to every question that cascades down the depth ladder of "five whys" to the root cause of any and all human root causes.

That 9-year-old kid there and then, in the blue, boys-medium Cub Scout uniform felt it then, but could never put words to it. Why we were there. Why some of those older, high-school graduates that we looked up to – having seen them rush for a touchdown, or bless themselves before stepping into the batter's box, or drive the lane for a layup – might never stand with us at that circle again.

Now, most of the men and women in our U.S. armed forces look like what they are, young kids. Children. People with whole lives ahead of them. What they sacrifice and are willing to sacrifice are so much less an abstraction, so much more unmistakably real.

"The Why" is a thing. Knowing it, conveying it, and engaging others in its elegant, simple profoundness can, bi-directionally, add fuel and reduce friction to get things done and make change. It's a super-power of placemakers, of builders, of developers, and all partners whose livelihoods orbit around making people's homes and neighborhoods.

But why, is another thing. It is a cry from an unknowably and unspeakably deep and dark place that at the same time binds us as only the unknowable and unspeakable can.

Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?

Don't stop before you get to the fifth why. That response counts most. When you set out to get at the root cause of purpose, reason, intention, and motivation to commit to the hard solutions to residential real estate, investment, and construction's major challenges – affordability, sustainability, resilience, and renewable human capability – the final, self-evident response as to a motive for tireless resolve in that one-time kid's heart and mind is this.

Our children. Your children. Their children.

This is the why underneath a home's reason for being, a neigbhorhood's essense, a community's timeless and perpetual value-creation.

Like as not, there'll be a 9-year-old near you standing by a flag in silence and stillness he or she or they can not fully grasp, but feels. The ground beneath and the men, women and other children around will be imparting the moment's meaning. Only later will it come clear.