Pace on Earth

My Hero

My phone rang at 9:30 this morning; it was Dad calling to tell me to get my ass in gear to get over to his place so we could make it to the Remembrance Day ceremony. I got dressed and headed over the bridge and met him and Will on the trail. We marched to the river side of the Cenotaph and a good vantage point of the soldiers from Gagetown in their parade greens.

The wind was cold and the speeches hard to hear but we did manage to figure out when the two minutes of silence started, and when the ceremony proper was over. We then headed a few steps down Queen St. to get a better view of the soldier's parade. As always, I was sad to see the numbers of the old veterans continue to dwindle, but again honoured to see the pride on their faces as they waved to an appreciative crowd.

After the parade we walked back to the homestead on George St. and dad gave me a piece of paper outlining the New Zealand War Memorial in Grevilliers France. It is a memorial for the "Soldiers of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force who fell in the Battles of the Somme and the Advance to Victory, 1918, and have no graves".

On the bottom it has my Great-Grandfather's specifics:
Pacey, Rfn. William, 41106. 3rd Bn. 3rd (Rifle) Brigade. 27th March, 1918. Age 25. Son of William and Annie Pacey, of Taieri Rd., Halfway Bush, Wakari, Dunedin; husband of Mary Elizabeth Pacey, of Girton, Newark, England. Born at Bingham, Nottinghman, Endland.

I'll get there someday.

Pace out.

posted by Vitamin S @ 11:45 a.m.