The Winter Olympics, held in Sochi, Russia, have recently concluded. As a former athlete and champion, I completely understand a lot about the excitement and thrill of victory and also a little bit about the agony of defeat experienced in athletic competition. As it is with all competitions, there is a winner and several losers. In the Olympic Games, Winter and Summer, the top three competitors wins medals. All the other competitors just have another of many trips to foreign places to play sport games, and once over they all return home bringing nothing with them but memories….some good, others bad. It seems to me to be an extensive and prolonged involvement of time, expense, and sacrifice just to provide a person a chance for some world recognition. But the strengths and weaknesses of the Olympic Games is not the point of this discussion.
I have watched several competitions and events of this Winter Olympics. I have seen some wonderful and exciting performances. I have seen some individuals and teams win and many more lose. I really am happy for all of the participants. It is indeed a great honor to be chosen to represent your own country at such a grand international competition. Again however, that is not the point to my discussion.
When the medals are given to the top three finishers a great sadness overwhelms me at almost every presentation. I am speaking now only about America’s athletes. I am an American and I am a U.S. Armed Forces Military Veteran. I am also a serious student of American as well as world history. I full well know the great costs and sacrifices in human blood and life that has been and continues to be spent to win and to maintain our wonderful personal freedoms that we enjoy today as Americans.
It just breaks my heart and hurts my spirit deeply that so very few Americans, particularly our finest athletes, have such little knowledge, respect, etiquette, and courtesy about our country, its flag, and its history. Maybe it was because I was raised by wonderful parents who educated all three of their children to respect their own Country, its Flag, and its National Anthem. We three children were taught and were expected to properly and correctly display what we knew to do whenever we were in the presence of an American Flag, the playing of the National Anthem, and the singing of the beautiful melody and words as they told the story of our nation, exactly as penned by Francis Scott Key.
When a person realizes just how much blood, guts, and human life has been spilled and lost so as to protect our own citizens and their freedoms starting all the way back to 1776 and our Declaration of Independence, one begins to understand the magnitude of those losses. Millions of men and women from all walks of life freely gave “their last full measure” protecting our rights and freedoms so that our flag may continue to wave and our citizens may continue to enjoy the freedoms and blessings given to us by our U.S. Constitution. Remember that the freedoms we now have were paid for with the sacrificed blood and lives of other Americans and our allies who fought on battlefields all over the world over the past 238 years of our national existence. And because others have paid that great price for us, we have a massive obligation to continue to pass along those same freedoms to all free Americans today and to the future generations following us.
My dad was a World War II U. S. Navy Chief Petty Officer. Whenever the U.S. Flag was presented, no matter where the location happened to be, you as an American citizen respectfully and immediately stood up at attention, you removed any type or kind of headgear you happened to be wearing. You ceased all talking or making any type of other motions or other noises with any part(s) of your body. You immediately put your right hand, locked in a hand salute position, over your heart (over your left breast). You looked directly at the Flag and followed it with your eyes and body until it was far past your position and out of your line of sight. Only then could you lower your hand, look back to the front, reposition any head gear, and resume any communication with other people.
If the National Anthem was played in conjunction with the presentation of the Flag, you proudly stood erect, at attention, with your right hand over your heart and sang the words of the song from memory.
All it required for we children to learn… that a man never wore a hat of any kind including a baseball cap and the like inside of a building or while the U.S. Flag was passing in front of you,… was to endure one disciplined instructional period with my Dad, his own leather belt, and my own dropped trousers which then presented a bare bottom target for my father to inflict some personal guidance and correction. I was real quick to pick up on what was expected as concerns courtesy and respect for the American Flag and our own National Anthem.
I only wish our top athletes had been given that same instruction that my father gave me. What breaks my heart is when most,…not all… American medal winners stand up on the podium and their own country’s flag is slowly raised and their National Anthem is being played in unison with the presentation of the flag, and they are fidgeting around, sloppily learned over to one side or the other, almost as if uninterested in the magnificence of the moment. I so wished they better understood what that flag and the anthem is all about. I so wished that the winners would snap to attention, place their right hand over their own heart and sing the words to the National Anthem until it is finished playing. That is really not asking too much is it? That Flag, Old Glory, represents all the lives sacrificed for the free nation for which it stands. That National Anthem portrays the reverence and respect for the price paid by our ancestors so that we could remain a free and independent nation under God.
The freedom to participate in the Olympic Games as a free American is a blessing. Any financial or non-financial rewards or benefits earned as a participant are a personal reward are they not? What is wrong with blessing back your own nation and its fore bearers with a personal show of love and respect by saluting the Flag and singing the National Anthem?
You see beloved friends, the proper showing of love and respect for all of our country and particularly to those great men and women who have given their lives protecting our constitutional rights and freedoms is what is being respectfully given when ever you recognize the U.S. Flag in such a manner as I am discussing.
Your undivided love, respect, attention, and gratefulness is being given to those who gave their lives protecting our nation on the battlefields of the world. Recognition is given to those who actually died and also to the survivors and the families of all those who freely gave their lives serving their nation.
Oh what a great message would be sent for all the world to see as all Americans displayed such love and respect for their own citizens past, present, and future. Love and respect of country, of family, and of freedom is a beautiful and glorious thing to witness. It is the glue that binds the people of a nation together.
Come on America, all of us can do that. And if all of us show such thankfulness and gratefulness through our own lives and our athlete’s lives, then just maybe we can teach our elected politicians, and the other national leaders of the world, how to do the same thing as they conduct the affairs of our own and their own nations.
As a U.S. citizen you have certain unalienable rights, freedoms, and privileges. They are yours for the taking. They are already fully paid for by those fully devoted souls who previously went before you and me. It is our own moral responsibility to insure those generations who follow us have the very same freedoms we all have to enjoy today.
You be the right example from this day forward. Whenever the U.S. Flag and/or our National Anthem is presented. Stand up, stop moving around, remove your hat, cease talking, come to attention, put your right hand over your heart, acknowledge the flag, and sing the lyrics of the national anthem as it is being played. Other people will do what they see you doing!
Peace and Love to All of You………………..Poppa Bear