He Was A Young Private That Fought In The American Revolution

 Grandma Lu had not been feeling well for quite some time. At first it seemed like a little cold, then it turned into a cough. She had gone to the doctor twice and had been taking lots of medicine. At long last she had slept all night long without coughing. She was congratulating herself as she fixed herself some coffee when she heard the phone ring. She answered it with quite a rough sounding 'hello' when her friend answered back and said, "You sound terrible!" Grandma Lu chuckled and said, "Thanks a lot, girl. I am getting better. I guess this just takes time to get over. I have heard a lot of people are have the same thing. Actually you don't sound so hot yourself."

As the ladies visited Grandma Lu's friend said, "You  must not be feeling up to snuff. You haven't written any stories lately and even today, you haven't written your usual story about Veteran's Day."

Grandma Lu shook her head and said, "You know what? I haven't even looked at a calendar except for doctor appointments lately. I tell you what. I'm going to finish my coffee and sit down and see if I can think of something new. People are probably tired of hearing my same old stories." She started to cough and she and her friend said their good-byes, I love yous, and take cares and hung up their phones.

Grandma Lu walked over to her computer with her big cup of cold water. "I have had gallons of this stuff to drink. I think I should just float away." She turned on her computer and just stared at the screen trying to think of the first time she had ever heard about a veteran in her family. She started to type and thought, "I was just a child at my grandparents' house. They had lots of company that day. There was a lady there whose name was Lois Kuderle. I can remember my mother saying that she was the historian of the family. That lady wore her hair in a bun at the nape of her neck and was so old she was bent over! Children were not allowed to talk or be close to the grownups at a family gathering, but I can remember that lady opening up a very large book that my grandma called the Hayes Family Bible. That lady wrote something in the Bible and put a tiny newspaper clipping in it. That was not a bit interesting to me at all. I promptly forgot all about it for about seventy years. At least seventy years!

Many many years later...

I was cleaning and sorting my mother's house and of course, opened up my mother's Family Bible she had inherited from my grandmother. As I leafed through the pages of family history there it was. The tiny newspaper clipping about a several times great grandfather Hayes being a soldier in the American Revolution. I can remember covering my mouth thinking at that time over two hundred years ago a member of my family was fighting for my right of freedom and he didn't have a clue that I would ever exist. He just knew that freedom was worth risking his life for. He did live to know that his fighting for freedom was a success because just a few months later the Declaration of Independence was signed.

Grandma Lu sat by her computer thinking of all the men that followed that young private. Her late husband in WWII her many brothers-in-laws, uncles, and brother and cousins. There was even a cousin that was a girl that was in the Army! War is Hell they say, but not having freedom would be unthinkable. Grandma Lu shut off her computer and thought to herself, Thank you. Two words that mean so much, but sound so simple. Thank you to all the Veterans that made our freedom possible throughout the many years.