Mindful - Pomfret p 1 5-30-24
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- Category: Current Issue
captions, page 4, clockwise from top left:
Pomfret Lions President Peter Lusa awarded $300 to essay contest winner, eighth grader Hattie Patenaude.
As is traditional, the Pomfret Lions Club handed out American flags.
Walter and Carolyn McGinn
From left: Kadence Morris, 4, Riley Stately, 5, and Sydney Stately, 3, all of Pomfret
Matt and Jan Rondeau with Stephanie Ellsworth
Pierce Basch, 1, of Ashford
Mindful and solemn
Pomfret Memorial Day remembrances
By Linda Lemmon
Town Crier Editor
“When I was a kid, I couldn’t understand why my grandfather was sad.”
Hattie Patenaude, winner of the Pomfret Lions Club essay contest, recalled watching her grandfather, a veteran of the Vietnam war, take part in the town’s Memorial Day parade. “I could see that this was a special yet emotional day for him. I could see sadness and respect” when Taps was played. Looking back, she understood why, as a child, she saw sadness.
Memorial Day is a day to remember military members who passed in service to this country. She urged those attending the program, post parade, to take a solemn moment.
She recalled a famous quote about dying twice. We die when we pass and we die again when those who remembered us pass.
State Senator Mae Flexer read the words of her father, a chaplain.
State Representative Pat Boyd assigned some homework. “Too often we’re go-go-go,” he said. He urged those attending to pause and pay attention to all the plaques and monuments all around them in town including plaques at the Rectory School, the monument at the Town Green, the plaques at the Pomfret Volunteer Fire Department and more.
“These are Pomfret residents who gave the last full measure,” he said. “Looking at these reminders will give us perspective on a day like this one.”
In his remembrance, fire department member and retired Marine Corps officer and pilot, Nicholas Stellitanto explained the significance of Memorial Day by saying “Close your eyes. What do you hear? Deafening silence.” What you don’t hear: ‘I love yous’ or ‘thank yous’ or ‘good nights’. There are no hugs from those who paid the ultimate sacrifice. That silence is carried by those left behind. On Veterans Day you can deliver your thank you message in person. Not Memorial Day.
Stellitanto quoted President James Garfield: “We hold reunions, not for the dead, for there is nothing in all the earth that you and I can do for the dead. They are past our help and past our praise. We can add to them no glory, we can give to them no immortality. They do not need us, but forever and forever more we need them.”
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