MY TURN By MARK J. YABLONSKY

Commemorate those who served This coming Monday the start to summer begins with Memorial Day, that wonderful time of barbecues, ballgames and iced cold drinks. That is as it should be, for we Americans love these types of holidays and always will. But without the sacrifice of our brave men and women of the armed forces, none of this would be possible; indeed, it is for them alone that Memorial Day even exists. Begun after the death of Abraham Lincoln, the beloved 16th president, Memorial Day was really first known as Decoration Day when the graves of fallen soldiers were marked with flags and other commemorations. These are the soldiers who did not survive to be welcomed home as heroes; they are the ones who didn’t make it back from Gettysburg in 1863, from Belle Wood in 1917, from Normandy in 1944, from North Korea in 1953, from Vietnam in 1969 and, more recently, from the brutal, arid deserts of Irag and Afghanistan. They are the ones who paid the ultimate price, the ones who died so that freedom and liberty might live, the very ones without whom freedom or liberty could even hope to exist. Despite political upheavals, wildly fluctuating stock markets, failing banks and highly successful ones, the American soldier has always been there to defend the country. The military has been there through thick and thin, fighting and, when necessary, even caring for victims, both friend and foe alike. While political correctness has done much to erode some of our liberties along the way, the American soldier has been and always will be there when threats to our security arise. Today, then, let us not forget who the American soldier is and what he/she represents. From a personal perspective, one of them was the late Lt. Roslyn B. Yablonsky, my mom, who served in intelligence during World War II and who fortunately did live for many years afterward. But if you know of someone who has stepped forward and unfortunately did not return home, then please go ahead and throw an extra hamburger or hot dog on the grill for them. They and my mom would have wanted it that way.