Remembering

"There's a graveyard in northern France where all the dead boys from D-day are buried. The white crosses reach from one horizon to the other. I remember looking over it and thinking it was a forest of graves. But the rows were like this, dizzying, diagonal, perfectly straight, so after all it wasn't a forest but an orchard of graves. Nothing to do with nature, unless you count human nature." -Barbara Kingsolver

After any sort of tragedy, or sorrow, human nature is to crave order. We find comfort in structure, and neatness. Any sort of chaos is maddening. Before we went to the American gravesite in Normandy, we visited the memorial in Caen. The museum started off with information about World War I. You started at the top and the walls were smooth and white. As the exhibit led into the start of World War II, you started to descend downwards, and the walls got darker and rougher. The subject matter itself grew heavier. The dark twisty spiral symbolic of the war perfectly juxtaposed the flawless rows of stark white graves which depicted the aftermath. Perfect order, structure, neatness.

The actual graves actually seem like an optical illusion when you look out at them. It really is dizzying. And somber. Inscribed on the tombs isn't the day the soldiers died, but the day their body was found. Because most of the men who are buried in that cemetery died on the same day--June 6th 1944, D-day, Jour-J, whatever you want to call it. When we started the tour of the cemetery, the guide posed a question. "Have you ever stood in a place where the course of history changed forever?" Interesting to think about. But you feel it in that place, you feel the history, you connect with it. Walking along Omaha Beach, which is now serene and peaceful, forces you to reflect on all the organized chaos that happened there a mere 60 years ago. It forces you to remember. It wasn't that long ago. We learn about D-day as though it happened in some far away land, a long time ago. For us, it's in the past. But on the beaches, and in the cemetery, and in the towns that were left in ruins, this war is very much a part of the present.

I always find it fascinating to learn about world history through the eyes of another country. France has it's own take on World War II that is completely different than the one that we have in the US. And the stereotypical American perception of France's involvement in the war is far from accurate. The memorial in Caen also had an exhibit on the Cold War. The Cold War is something I've never learned about outside of the US. Every culture has a tendency to gloss over the parts of their history that tarnishes the country to some extent. It's just interesting to think there are always at least two sides to every story, and we consistently only ever hear one.