For the last few years I’ve been thinking I must get up and go to an ANZAC Day dawn service. This year I finally did it. And, despite the early morning it was so worth it.
On the way to the service I was thinking how lucky we are that we weren’t the soldiers in those boats at Gallipoli waiting for dawn before they attacked. I can’t even begin to imagine how they might have been feeling.
I was a bit surprised at how busy it was but we found a park and commenced our walk. We were just in time to walk alongside the small march that preceded the service. There’s something about bagpipes that works sometimes and it certainly worked for me and added to the atsmosphere of the whole thing.
The service lasted for about 45 minutes and I was really impressed with the two high school prefect’s speeches and how they’d done some research into how their families had participated in wars.
JJ did really well too. He started to get a bit bored about half way through but I realised after he’d moved forward a bit that it was because he couldn’t see anything. Apparently his Scout group participated in the big Adelaide city march, so he might be doing that next year.
I was also really pleased to see people of absolutely all ages there, from kids still in their pajamas, to high school kids, to people our age and older.
I hate war and I hate the thought of war but I love this ANZAC spirt and how it’s carried on for nearly 100 years. It reminds us that people fought and died so that we can live a pretty damned priveleged life and for that I’m really really grateful.
And the “Last Post” puts a lump in my throat every time. If you’re not familiar with it, please listen.
