Lest we forget

Today is, of course, Veterans Day.  Today, we honor those who served in the armed forces of our nation, in wartime and in peacetime.

I remembered, as I do every year, that November 11 is Veterans Day.  I remembered as well that it was originally called Armistice Day, as a commemoration of the agreement to end hostilities in the Great War (that is, World War I).  At the eleventh hour, on the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

What I forgot this morning is that today is a no-work holiday for me.

My first clue might have been that only one other person stood at my bus stop when the 7:51 run turned the corner to pick us up.  But that’s happened before.  And perhaps I might have thought something was different when relatively few passengers boarded at later stops, but that too has happened before.  At the downtown stop where I changed to a different bus, and going up the hill to my workplace, I again failed to note that anything was different about the day.

Even when I walked past the entrance to my building’s underground parking garage and saw that its gate was closed, I did little other than wonder whether there might be construction or flooding or some other problem down there.

It suddenly all made sense when I got to the building’s front entrance ... and found that the door was locked. 

I knew that the University of Washington and related organizations trade a federal holiday for the day after Thanksgiving, and it had somehow gotten into my mind that the traded holiday was Veterans Day.  In a flash, as I pulled at a door that wouldn’t open, I remembered that our traded holiday is instead Columbus Day!

Sheepishly, I retraced my bus trip.  So I’m back at home now, prepared to enjoy a relaxing day off.  I missed the blessed opportunity to sleep in, but I won’t miss a delectable midweek lunch at nearby Paseo Caribbean.  Mmmmmmmmm…

While we’re not forgetting, let’s hail the 120th anniversary of Washington’s admission to the Union as the 42nd state.  On November 11, 1889.

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