I wrote this last year, but I think that it's still applicable this year.

I know that these days, today is more generally known as Veterans Day, and I'm not saying that I don't want to honor all veterans. Whether I agree with war or not, I think that it's important to remember that their experiences have been hard ones, and that 25% of veterans in the United States are homeless. We should be doing right by them, both the living and the dead.

But for me, November 11th is Armistice Day, the day when World War I, the Great War, ended. Let me say that I don't deny the horrific nature of any war, or that one is necessarily worse than any other. However, the Great War is the one that's always resonated with me the most, and the one that makes me cry the easiest. It's the one that fascinates and terrifies me the most, because it was the dividing line between the death of the 19th century and the birth of the 20th. If you ever really want to freak me out or get me into a depressed headspace, all you really have to do is play me music from or about that time period. I can guarantee you that I'll be crying very shortly.

I didn't really know a whole lot about the war growing up. My grandfather was of the generation who fought in World War II, and I never knew my great-grandparents, since they died before I was born. The first time that I ever really heard anything about it was in Social Studies class in high school, and it fascinated me. The Victorian attitude toward war that folks went into it with, combined with the grim realities of the trenches, No Man's Land, barbed wire, and mustard gas, was compelling. I admit that my interest has been deepened by the Wraith: the Great War setting book for White Wolf's Wraith the Oblivion, but it's mostly because they did a damned good job of dramatizing the events of those years. Robert Service is one of my favorite poets, particularly for his Rhymes of a Red Cross Man.

Dan Carlin puts things into words a lot better than I do, so if you're interested, go on over to Hardcore History, and listen to episode 8, "Scars of the Great War".

Here's a couple of good songs in memory of the day. The first is "Battle of the Somme" by Luke Kelly.

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And for the German side of things, "Ich hatte einen Kameraden":

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And finally, a song that's not period, but that talks of the period: the Dropkick Murphy's version of "No Man's Land (The Green Fields of France)", originally by Eric Bogle:

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