WikiLeekZ

Naperville, IL     September 16, 2001

Good morning Family and Friends,

This morning, I wish you all a thoughtful, somber Memorial Day. To me, this is an especially subdued weekend compared to those of the past. This year, the Memorial Day weekend seems to be serving a dual purpose; its traditional pause for us to remember those men and women lost in the wars of our nation and this year, to reflect upon the more than 100,000 of us who have perished in just a few recent, short months.

And, it’s much more than the 100,000 Americans and the deaths of so many others on our earth, but the grieving and the loss felt by so many family and friends.

I’m wondering if we are becoming too accustomed to these extraordinary daily casualty figures. They’re awful numbers, but to some of our leaders, they seem to be just numbers and too often I’ve heard ‘very good numbers’, trump calls high US Covid-19 numbers a "badge of honor" and “we’re doing very well”*

 

This historic era, that we’re all a part of, reminds me more and more each day of the statement Joseph Stalin made  - “One death is a tragedy; one million is a statistic”.

When I hear trump, without a scintilla of empathy- nor even a slight measure of humanity, do and say what he has said and done during this tragic time, I shake my head in disbelief. Even now, as this disaster slowly evolves, he’s vindictive, self-congratulatory, anti-science and mean spirited – precisely at the time when our country needs the exact opposite.

                            

I took the picture of the field of flags in front of a civic building during an art show right after 9/11 and now, our country is losing the equivalent of lives lost on 9/11 in NYC, WDC and PA every 2 days, or less.

Think of what our country, our President, did** in terms of national and international effort in the wake of that tremendous loss and consider what our president has done and is doing now when we’re losing many more American citizens now.

I’ve been lucky; I’ve lost no relatives or friends in our wars, no one to the Corona Virus but do have friends who are on the front lines of this plague.

On this Memorial Day, I will be thinking of the military losses, the Corona Virus losses and the sacrifices so many Americans are making now.

Take care. Be well. Wash hands.

Zeny

*as the number approached 90,000 deaths.

** don’t think too deeply