JAMES J. GREEN The Standard
As one of The Standard Newspaper’s Videographers I always look forward to filming the Remembrance day parades, and the ceremonies at the cenotaph. Several of these filmings will be available on our website so people can view past remembrance day ceremonies and parades, and still join in remembering those who served to keep us safe.
My hope of filming this years ceremonies was deferred, as our province’s battle with covid has claimed the parades and most ceremonies are being held privately, for the protection of our Veterans, as well as ourselves.
However, God has made sure or Vets are not forgotten. The parade will not be in the streets but in the skies. This year a small meteor shower, The Northern Taurids, will coincide with Remembrance day, spanning Nov. 11th and 12th. and again on the 16th and 17th with the Leonid meteor shower.
As many of us will be home due to the current conditions, I would encourage each of us to take some time if possible on November 11th to watch the meteor shower, expanding on our moment of silence at 11am with a moment of screen silence at 11pm. You may not see this meteor shower if your eyes don’t adjust to first. It takes about 15 minutes without porch-lights, flashlights, or cellphones, even if just checking the time, to fully let your eyes adjust to the darkness so we can fully appreciate the night sky.
For every “falling star” you see, please think about it as one of our fallen heroes. As each “star” disappears please remember that with the brief moment of their lives each of these brave men and women sacrificed themselves for our well being.
In our darkest hour, our Veterans helped bring a little light back into the world, even if just for a moment. For that let’s honour them. Let’s deliberately remember to go out of our way to find one of the available poppy boxes, as the Vets won’t be canvasing this year, and put some money into one of the boxes to support our Veterans on November 11th, whether we take a poppy or not.