Jefferson Barracks

I was thinking today of Monday November 11, 2013 being Veteran's Day.  Veteran's Day when I was a kid was an important thing.  We studied what it was to be a Veteran and what they did the week before.  We had service men and women come to our elementary schools and do a flag raising ceremony outside.  We had assemblies to honor our family members that were military.  One year I got to bring my own father's pictures in from when he was stationed in Germany.  Only the nice pictures, I could not show the incinerators.  My dad was there just before Vietnam.  So it was an important thing for me. 

Well anyway today when I was out I had this pull to go to JB cemetery and county park.  While there I got out and started walking the rows of headstones in a section.  I suddenly got remorsefully overwhelmed with emotions.  I started to cry, tears just running down my face, sobbing.  I could feel the sad, the loss, and great pride for what these men and women did for us and our country.  I cried and spoke sobbing words, 'Thank you', 'Help us', 'Go to him now to help', 'Keep us safe', 'Thank you, Thank you.'  Just like yesterday when I passed out at work and hit the floor, this experience I had never felt before either.

I looked up and there was a single white butterfly flying over me.  The kind you find in your vegetable garden, the small really pretty all white one.  I asked it to take my prayers and tears to where they needed to be and then I felt like I was going to start wailing like a mourner in one of those old movies that you would watch and try to figure out why the lady was crying so hard and throwing herself on the casket.  I knew I had to get into the car.  And just as I got into the car I started wailing just like those characters in the movies.  And rocking too.  I felt it was all I could do was cry and wail and rock sitting there in my car.  Calling out for thanks, help and protection.  It was the oddest sensation.

When I got home I was completely spent.  I tried to call a couple of people to talk to me on my drive home to keep me focused on driving.  No one answered and I started crying again feeling all alone on my short journey.  Well I made it home and was so spent like I said that I lay on the couch, but could not fall a sleep like I wanted to.  I still feel spent, but not as tear ridden. 

When I went to the County Park side I went to the scenic circle and snap some pictures of the river and the iron gates.  While there guess what I saw?  A white butterfly just like, maybe the same one, that came to me in the cemetery.  I think I need to go look up totem information on that white butterfly.

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