Dear Sergeant Merlin German,

From one fellow New Yorker to another.

I thank you for your services to our country. You lived only half my age, but accomplished something I will never be able to accomplish. You carried an enormous amount of our burden on your young shoulders. You sacrificed everything life had in store for you. You placed your dreams and future aside. You made your parents more proud than my own parents could ever be, for me.

One thing I am not sure. I am not sure if your death will be commemorated as it should. I am nor sure if your sacrifices will be paid its dues. I am not sure if there will be a collective hold of breath and a tear in anyones eye for the loss this country suffered with your passing away. I am not sure if your life will be accorded the heroic adulation and glorification as it should. I am not sure if you will be honored in the annals of our nation’s heroes as we so willingly do for ball players and undeserving celebrities.

As America goes about it’s business, as this country continues to mention the loss of lives of our brave soldiers in passing with a footnote, as we continue to overlook the loss of young lives with little more than statistics and numbers, America must come to grips with its lack of acknowledgment of our young soldiers, both, in praise and in kind. Our media has sunk to a new low and it is time they redeem themselves. It is time we pay attention to those truly deserving of our attention and more importantly, pay respect to those, who are more deserving of our respect and adoration.

I admire the skills of a ball player and his ability to smack speed the ball at 95 miles per hour in the zone. I admire the moves of a pro, whose handling of the hoop ball hauls in high paying box seat fans. It is very alluring to see members of the academy honor the highly paid stars with another gleaming object of envy for portraying someone they are not. A soldier cannot entertain us. Everything he or she does is a game of life and death. Their actions are bound by a reality show few of us would ever want to participate in.

It is time we honor the members of our armed forces with similar and higher super stardom. It is time we begin to draw high paying contracts to our soldiers. The skills set required to be able to lay down one’s life in harms way cannot be acquired by any ball player or an Oscar winner. Ever!

It is time, we as a country of faith and honor begin to pay our respects and acknowledgment to our fallen, wounded and fighting heroes not just in words but in deeds as well.

Merlin German, I thank you for your courage and your sacrifices. I thank the courage of your parents to be so giving and selfless. I thank your family for the gift they gave to our nation.

You will not be forgotten!

Merlin German - Merlin’s Miracles