Wagner War Memorial Vandalized

I first heard about this with a Facebook post on my newsfeed.  I was shocked to hear that someone, or some people had vandalized the war memorial in Wagner, South Dakota.  Shocked, outraged, disgusted, pissed off. I was a little bit of everything.  But leave it to an actual Veteran and a very well written article in the Wagner Post put some 'better spin,' on the incident.

It said,

A veteran, worn and weathered, sat at the wall, in tears. They didn't understand his sacrifice. They didn't remember all the good men he remembered. They hadn't seen brave men die, crying out for their mothers, like he did. He wondered if, maybe, they would have understood respect if they had seen what he had seen. He said, shaking with indignation, "I'm angry."

The morning of Friday, September 13th revealed an embarrassing display of immaturity. The Armed Forces Memorial that stands in Wagner's community park had been vandalized during the night. The ground around the memorial was littered with brown apple cores that had been used to draw and write on the stone that held veteran's names.

Although he asked to remain anonymous, the veteran leapt into action and called the mayor, Don Hosek. Hosek, upon being notified of the occurrence, immediately put a call in to the police. Beyond this, it is unclear what actions were taken to remedy the situation.

The veteran, sitting at the memorial, overcome with grief at the lack of respect shown the men who fought to protect us, taught a rare lesson in perspective that morning. He did not blame, nor did he speak rashly, but he did ask why. Why and how someone was allowed to grow up without being taught to respect those who give their lives to protect them.

It's sad that it happened.  At the same time it's another smack to the back of the head that we all sometimes need to remember.  To remember what these real life hero's sacrificed for our country.

I hope they're able to restore the monument to it's original state.  To whoever did it, 'hey, that wasn't too good of an idea you had.'

Oh, to whoever wrote the article in the paper, perfectly written.  Perfect!