What Good Are A News Columnist's Thoughts on Unknown Soldiers?

     "No writer can adequately express the beauty of the service person’s call to duty; no painter can paint it, no song can capture it’s fullness no matter how beautifully each measure is written. But at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier the beauty becomes clear, in silence and dignity, and something that feels like a hint of angels guarding the guards themselves. And that beauty is something we can be worthy of if we develop souls that aspire to honor only that which is good, and turn away from the trivial, the fleeting, and the evil. Time is shorter than we think, as a country and as a society. Let us use the service person’s example to shine a light that will show us the way out of the darkness. The guard walks the mat, with thoughts known only to himself and to God, who also knows the identities of the Unknown Soldiers – all of them."

Those words come at the end of a moving article by columnist Deirdre Reilly, about the 2010 U.S. troop surge in Afghanistan, after she visited the Tomb of the Unkowns, formerly known as the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, representing all unknowns. Written for the Reading Advocate and syndicated by Gatehouse News Service, her article is titled:  Sobering Thoughts on New Troop Surge to Afghanistan. Are you a columnist? Do you ever wonder "What good are a news columnist's thoughts about...matters of importance?" Read Deirdre's entire article and see what you think then. Be encouraged to take your writing where it needs to go to be of some good. Bravo.

Opening Quote Source: Reading (MA) Advocate newspaper, of Gatehouse News Service, 2009.

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