Happy Tuesday, my sunburned little lobsters. I hope everyone had a lovely weekend on America's highways. Personally, I burned enough petrol to keep us in Middle East wars for years to come! USA! USA!

Actually, I had a surprisingly appropriate Memorial Day moment during a holiday visit to my cousin Sean when he turned to me with a smile and said "Want to come to the basement and see something cool?" Now, in past years I wouldn't have gone anywhere near a dank basement with that kid, but in his old age he has mellowed into a family man, so I was reasonably sure that my body wasn't going to be slapped with anything sticky and/or ball pain-inducing.

What he showed me was extremely cool: it was the WWII-era rifle that belonged to his grandfather (my great uncle Big Frankie). I don't know a ton about guns, but I'm pretty sure it was an M1 Garand and it was in absolutely perfect condition... except for a few teeth marks on the butt of the gun, presumably where Big Frankie had knocked the grill out of a few German soldiers.

Big Frankie died when I was about ten or so, but I remember him as an easygoing, fun-loving old guy who enjoyed a beer and a barbecue and spent a good portion of the day laughing with his family. As was common in his generation, I don't think he talked much about the details of what he saw and did in the war. I know my own grandfather didn't talk much about it at all.

Holding this rifle in my hand with the German teeth marks on the butt really floored me. I tried to put myself in the position where someone with murderous intent was close enough that I had to hit him in the teeth with my rifle butt. Then, I tried to imagine the Big Frankie I knew and loved in the position where he was forced to viciously knock someone's head off.

It's really a tough contradiction to get my head around. These kind, decent family patriarchs spent a significant part of their youths living in a war zone, fearing for their own lives and taking the lives other young men. And it happened again with my parents' generation in Vietnam and it's happening now to my generation in the Middle East.

I don't know that I came to any great revelations holding Big Frankie's rifle in my hands. So many thoughts and feelings flooded my brain, from admiration and gratitude for the bravery of so many soldiers to anger and frustration that war is still happening in the world. Mostly, I'm just sort of in awe. I'm in awe of all that the soldiers in the armed forces, past and present, are willing to sacrifice.