The Silence of Remembering

The details of my first visit to the Tomb of the Unknown soldier at Arlington National Cemetery are permanently etched in my mind. My family and I were on a sight-seeing vacation to Washington, DC and I was a just entering my teen years. I was at that age – you know the one – the age when my knowledge of the mysteries of  life far surpassed that  of my parents, or any other authority figure, or so I thought. The age when the future lay ahead and sitting around remembering the things of the past seemed like a colossal waste of my adolescent time.It was a hot, sunny, day as we made our way to the Tomb. Away from the city noise of D.C., the first thing I noticed at the Tomb was the silence. This was no ordinary silence. It was a silence filled with solemnity, with ritual and with sadness. We stood and watched as the military guard, dressed from head to toe in the most perfectly kept uniform, marched back and forth, back and forth, back and forth before the tomb of his fallen brothers. After a what seemed like an eternity of silent watching, we witnessed the ceremony of the changing of the guard – a ceremony, I later learned, which takes place around the clock, day and night, rain or shine, no matter who is or isn’t watching. The guards, it occurred to me, are not putting on a show for the sake of the grumpy teenage tourist and her family. They are about something far greater.In the silence and rhythmic repetition of the Tomb Guard’s walk, my own adolescent brain, seemingly hard-wired for noisy activity, had the time to stop and reflect on what was really happening in front of my eyes. Here