I have been to see the Vietnam Veterans Memorial – The Moving Wall when it came to my hometown of Middleboro, Massachusetts, but I’ve never had the opportunity to see the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington DC until this past week.
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall is in HONOR all of the members of the U.S Armed Forces who served in the Vietnam War. The names of those who gave their lives and of those who remain missing are inscribed on the wall, in the order that they died or were reported as missing.
My father lost two very close friends while they were serving in the Vietnam War and I wanted to find their names. I thought they would be in alphabetical order; instead they are listed in order of the month of the year they died; I didn’t know the year or month so I couldn’t find their names.
Then I saw a man point out his friend’s name on the wall and asked how he found the name so easily. He told me that he went online and found a website where you type in the name of the person and it tells you the number stone and row of names and number in from that row.
Next time I come to Washington DC I am going to go to this website and find the place where my dad’s friend’s names are and leave a flower in their memory. It brought tears to my eyes to see a woman that was about my age making a trace imprint on two pieces of paper of her uncles’ names who she never met.
The pathway along the wall with the solemn list of names is brick and it is difficult in some areas to wheel over the cracks between the bricks. The brick path could use more dirt or cement to fill in the cracks so that the families of our heroes and the brave fighting men and woman who lost their friends beside them and are now disabled due to the lost of use of their legs could have an easier ride/wheel along the brick path to see their friends’ names.
I give The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall USA FIVE STARS to all the heroes who have lost their lives for our country and for our freedom. My thoughts after seeing this wall are the same I had after seeing the Vietnam Moving Wall: God Bless Our Soldiers – Past and Present and Hope One Day Our World Is Full Of Peace.