Thank you Jeff for the header.  While Veteran's Day honors the living service men and women in this country, it is also fitting to remember those who have died. My father, like so many of today's veterans, returned after serving in the Navy during the Korean War, physically and mentally a different person. 

My wish for today's veterans would be to see our country recognize their skills and talents and to put them to work at fixing our country.  My dad enjoyed physical work and he liked to draw.  He studied architecture at Case Western Reserve University, where he met my mom, who attended nearby Ursuline College (at the top of Cedar Hill).  He was fortunate in the service to not see combat (he served on a submarine), but he did suffer physically after the war due to maneuvers that were later determined to be beyond his physical capacity.  He was treated at the Veterans Administration Hospital in University Circle.

I wish I had half of the talents my father possessed.  He was able to take complex clocks apart and to fix them.  He endeavored to build his own sailboat (but as his health declined, it sat in our garage, unfinished for years).  He could draw and paint and had a multitude of tools that I enjoyed playing with as a child--that I would use to build a go-cart for the neighborhood.  He loved music and would bellow songs from the Man of La Mancha.  And, he loved history and taking trips to visit state parks and historic sites.  He romanced the past.  He had flaws, too--a bad temper and the tendency to start something and not finish it.  I am most like my dad.  But, I am sure he knew that I recognized his talents, before he died.  I try.