Arlington National Cemetery

This past weekend we went to Arlington National Cemetery. Every year, around the holidays, we see it on the new that the “Worcester Wreath Company” donates wreaths to the family and friends of fallen soldiers.  A little about the Worcester Wreath Company and the man who started it from their website:

“Worcester Wreath and its involvement with the Arlington project was inspired at the early age of 12 years old when, as a Bangor Daily News paper boy, Morrill Worcester won a trip to the Nation’s Capital. It was a trip he would never forget, and Arlington National Cemetery (Official Site)made an indelible impression. In later life, he recognized that his success as a businessman was in large part, due to the values of this Nation and the Veterans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.

In 1992, the Wreath Company found themselves with an excess of wreaths nearing the end of the holiday season. Seeing an opportunity to make a boyhood dream a reality, efforts to do something special with those wreaths began in earnest. With the help of Maine Senator Olympia Snowe, arrangements were made for the wreaths to be placed at Arlington in one of the older sections of the cemetery, a section which received fewer visitors with each passing year.

On Saturday, December 12, 2009, Morrill Worcester, owner of Worcester Wreath Company, Harrington, Maine, will donate over 15,000 Maine balsam fir holiday wreaths to be placed on graves at the Arlington National Cemetery.  This will be the 18^th consecutive year that Mr. Worcester has donated wreaths at Arlington.  This year, Cemetery officials have assigned us Sections 2, 9, 31, 32 and 37 within the Cemetery for these wreaths to be placed. “

We have been to Arlington National Cemetery before, but this time around it was different. You can’t avoid the overwhelming emotion you feel once you are there. This time of the year, all the trees are bare and it highlights the presence of soo many headstones. You can’t stop thinking that we are living in a free country and we owe it to the soldiers who were laid down there as their final resting place. It is definitely weird to walk around, especially when you realize you are actually walking over soldiers graves. We were very careful while we took pictures, we were never very close to the mourning families. It is definitely a very eye opening experience. If you ever come to Washignton DC, Arlington cemetery is worth your time, maybe even more than the White House or the Capitol.