The elementary school teacher stood up abruptly from her chair causing a screech that drove the children to clamp their hands on their ears. Many gazed at the russet leaves slowly falling from the almost-naked trees outside the window. On November 11th, it seemed almost impossible for them to sit their “bums down on the carpet”.
“It’s not fair!” yelled one of the obnoxious kids from the back, who had not been listening to the teacher’s voice echo the poem “Flanders Fields.” As children nodded their heads in agreement, in hopes of receiving the 15-minute break that was postponed, the teacher felt a drop of sweat trickle down her forehead as she gazed at the scene of the classroom. The confidence they had in interrupting a lesson about Remembrance Day to complain about their first-world problems made the teacher understand why we remember.
July 28, 1914. World War I caused everyone physically present in 1914 to be wounded in some way, either mentally or physically. People of all social groups, races, and ages were impacted by this warfare. Those who survived the combat experienced life-long psychological torment, while the soldiers who died had their last glimpse of the world as gauzy clouds of smoke.
Whilst soldiers in 1914 slept in their tents, reciting childhood prayers in hopes of being able to live one more night, today’s children have the luxury of being able to sleep without the fear of tonight being their last. Without remembering their struggles, the fight for freedom in 1914 would be forgotten, just like the teacher who realized that colouring poppies would not teach these children why we remember.