No other province or territory feels the effects of Remembrance Day like Newfoundland does. At the time of the World Wars we were the Dominion of Newfoundland, a country separate from Canada with our own military force.
I had a whole spiel written about how the deaths of most of this provinces' able bodied men shaped a society doomed to fail.
I had written paragraphs on how today we still are condemning ourselves, Newfoundland consistently having the highest enlistment rate in the Canadian Armed Forces.
I'm so sick of us fighting other people's battles when we can't even win our own.
"There were only 225,000 of us in 1914, when the War began: fewer than 35,000 were males between, say, 15 and 30 years of age - the men who became soldiers. Some two thousand joined the Royal Navy.
In all, 12,425 men came forward to join the Regiment, and 6,200 actually served in its ranks. Six out of every ten became casualties. 1,304 - one in every five, 20% - were killed or died of wounds. 2,300 more - another two-fifths - were wounded.
The First World War took a terrible toll of human life and suffering, but no Dominion or Colony, and no country, paid a higher price than Newfoundland. . ."
Newfoundland suffered first as a country and now later we still suffer as a province. I won't ever forget that.
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Yesterday morning I woke up to the sound of a trumpet playing the last post at 11. I just layed there for a second thinking how nice it was that they hold ceremonies on campus. Then I got up to see where the music was coming from and there was a solitary student standing on the steps of meal hall playing to the entire Paton College.
It was probably the most moving Remembrance morning I've been to, even though it was so minimal.
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