EACH Anzac Day in towns and cities across our nation, something astonishing happens.
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Crowds in their thousands, crowds as disparate as the country itself, give up some of their public holiday simply to remember.
What’s more, numbers are increasing each year, confounding some who thought communal respect – especially among our youth – was dead in 21st-century Australia.
But should it really be a surprise?
Should we really be surprised that Anzac Day has become our surrogate national day – a day that grips our hearts like no other?
After all, it embodies the values – real, concrete human values – that define our character as a nation.
It’s about mateship, courage, resilience and respect.
And, beyond its symbolic meaning, it is a day simply to pay homage to real people who made real sacrifices.
Soon, there will be no World War II veterans left and in coming decades, the Vietnam vets will follow.
These servicemen and women, the few of them still left, are treasure troves of history.
They’re throwbacks to a generation so foreign from today’s.
And so much more admirable.
In an age where people think sacrifice means not having a video camera on their mobile phone, we could learn so much from looking back, for one day at least.
Please do that today.
Attend one of the many Anzac Day services around the region.
If you can’t do that, at least pause for a moment and reflect quietly about these tragic periods of history where the victims were real.
Really think about what a different world we would live in today without the sacrifice of these men and women.
Anzac Day is not about glorifying war and it’s not about sentimentality or jingoism.
Anzac Day is about remembering real Australians, real Tamworthians.
People who went to your school, people who lived in the same houses, and in many cases, people with the same blood.
Lest we forget.