This Veteran's Day was the same as every year. A single Facebook post goes up and then everyone suddenly remembers it's Veteran's Day. A general thank you is sent out and some of us enjoy a day off of work -- or school if you're lucky. But why is there only one day dedicated to thanking veteran's for their service?
There's whole months dedicated to various ethnicities diseases, and even foods. Yes, May is considered National Military Appreciation Month, however, you'd probably have to look up on Google what month that exactly was if you even knew there was a month dedicated to it in the first place.
Regardless of having a month dedicated in your honor of service or not, veterans deserve daily praise and gratitude for the sacrifices that they've made in their lives.
I am saddened by the amount of individuals who pass by veterans wearing merchandise of their branch and don't even stop to smile or say a polite, "thank you for your service." It's rude and shameful, especially when 22 veterans commit suicide every day. Yeah, 22 people who can't live with their PTSD anymore. 22 people who can't adjust to civilian life. 22 people who don't know what services are available to them or don't know how to use those services provided to veterans by the government. That's 22 too many in my eyes.
We owe the veteran's of this nation more than we are giving to them in terms of respect, help, and support in any way that they need. I'm even ashamed of some businesses who don't provide certain discounts for veterans depending on the kind of business it is. My last job didn't provide any type of military discount and on the rare occasions where I was asked for our military discount policy, my heart grew heavy as I was forced to explain that we don't provide discounts for members of the military in active duty or for veterans.
It's one of the biggest pet peeves of mine that our nation cheats our veterans out of a full, happy life. And unfortunately that statement is true, otherwise we wouldn't have 22 of them take their life every day.
So please, please the next time you see a veteran you're about to walk past, stop and shake their hand and thank them for their service. It could be just the thing they needed to hear to make their day that much better and make all their sacrifice worthwhile.
