In a tiny room, at the hospital down the road, a baby was born.  The room was filled with the typical things – a balloon that said “It’s a boy”, a bouquet of flowers with a huge blue bow, and a stuffed bear holding the American flag.  But more filled that room than what you could see with your eyes.  The room was filled with life.  The mother’s eyes were filled with love and hope, love for this child and hope of what he would become and achieve.  The father’s eyes were filled with pride, pride of having a son to whom he could give a legacy, a legacy of doing the right thing, protecting loved ones, and sacrificing for others. 

The father was a military man.  He was a normal husband and father, but being in the military had made him realize how precious every moment of life really was.  You see, a military lifestyle is one where life and death are constantly on the line.  So the question of whether serving in the military was worth that risk was often asked.  The father would tell his wife that it boiled down to doing what was right, and there was pride connected to that decision.

Ten years passed, the boy and his mother stood at a funeral with a flag draped coffin.  The blue field ran over the coffin’s head and left shoulder, the red and white stripes flowed down the body and over the feet.  The young boy looked up at his mother with teary, questioning eyes, and her own teary eyes looked back into his.  Kneeling beside him, she wrapped her arms around his little shoulders and with choked tears whispered into his ear.  “Daddy did the right thing.”  She explained that the blue field stood for home, and it covered his father’s head and heart, and it showed what his father was thinking of and what he loved.  The red and white stripes that covered the body and the feet showed that his blood was given to protect his loved ones, and that he sacrificed himself for them.  After her explanation, the boy was still mourning, but his expression had changed to one of pride, pride that his father did the right thing, pride because his father was in the military, and pride because this man right here, in the flag draped coffin, was his father.

Ten more years pass, in a tiny room, at the morgue, down the road, a young soldier from Afghanistan is put into a coffin.  A silver haired mother stands as two solders drape the American flag over her son.  As the blue field is laid over his head and left shoulder she knows that home was on his mind and heart.  As the red and white stripes flow down his body and over his feet, she knows that his blood was given to protect his loved ones, and he sacrificed for them.  Tears rolled down her cheeks.  But in her eyes, there is a look of pride, and it is the same look that his father had the day he was born. 

Their son had carried on his father’s legacy, a legacy about doing the right thing, about protecting loved ones, and sacrificing for others.  And there is a pride that comes for serving in the military, having your head and heart focused on home, and living your life fighting for what is right.