Memorial Day hits different when you’ve worn the uniform. For most folks, it’s burgers on the grill and flags flapping in the breeze. For us? It’s a gut punch wrapped in Red, White, and Blue. It’s the quiet weight we carry like a ruck full of bricks, and no matter how many years go by, it doesn’t get any lighter.
I wake up on Memorial Day with the same routine—zero-dark-thirty, coffee blacker than a moonless FOB night, and the ache of ghosts already lingering before the sun even thinks about showing face. I lace up my boots like I did back in the sandbox, tight and ready, muscle memory kicking in like clockwork. Even though there’s no mission op today, the heart still acts like there is.
Today’s not for me. It’s for the ones who didn’t get to ETS. For the ones who caught a one-way flight on an angel bird, flag over their chest, dog tags rattling like wind chimes in a storm. It’s for Doc, who patched us up with hands steadier than a sniper’s scope—until the day he couldn’t patch himself. For SGT Mac, the loudest son of a gun this side of the wire, who took point one last time and never came back.
Civilians say “Happy Memorial Day,” but ain’t nothing happy about it. That’s not on them—they mean well—but inside, we flinch. We remember the firefights like echoes in our bones. The smell of burnt cordite, blood in the sand, the hollow ring in your ears after an IED knocks the breath clean outta you. We carry those snapshots like Polaroids burned into our minds, flipped through when the world gets too loud—or too quiet.
At 1100 hours, I stand in front of the flag. No words, just a salute sharp enough to cut through memory. The names roll through my mind like a battle roster: Alpha to Zulu, every fallen warrior I had the honor to serve beside. We bled together, laughed over MREs and bad coffee, froze our asses off on patrol, and told the kind of dark jokes that only make sense when death’s always around the corner.
Memorial Day ain’t about politics or parades. It’s about the silence in the chow hall after a KIAs report. It’s the empty cot. The helmet resting on a rifle, boots standing at attention beneath. It’s taps played slow and haunting, cutting through your soul like a bayonet.
I drink tonight, not to forget, but to remember. One for each brother and sister who gave their all. One for the ones still fighting battles that don’t show up on a map. And one for me, still standing, still breathing, trying to make it all mean something.
So to the civilians reading this: enjoy your day, your freedom, your backyard BBQ. But take a moment—just one—and remember why this day exists. For those of us who know the cost, we carry it in our chest every damn day.
And to my battle buddies on the other side—save me a seat at the fire, keep the coffee hot. We’ll link up in Valhalla, when my boots finally stop walking.
Nineteen DeltaCav Scouts “The Eye’s and Ears”
RST. (Reconnaissance, Surveillance, Target Acquisition)
RLTW. (Rangers Lead The Way)
Scouts Out
Til Valhalla.Â