Six American Holidays That Are Actually About Our Troops
On discovering that Labor Day is a celebration of uniformed servicepeople
Labor Day (First Monday in September)
It took me a minute, but the Governor is right: Labor Day is about our men and women in uniform, the maids and fry cooks, the mechanics and nurses, the clowns and mimes who band together to institute workplace safety and tolerable limits to hours spent on the job. At your backyard barbecue, take a moment of silence to honor the Wobblies, the Teamsters, the SEIU, Actors’ Equity, and your local teachers and nurses unions. (Not the FOP, though. Those guys publish racist newsletters.)
September 5, coincidentally, was the day in 1781 the French won the Battle of the Chesapeake against the British Navy, thus securing American freedom.
Grandparents Day (First Sunday after Labor Day)
The men of the Greatest Generation came home from bombing Dresden and Hiroshima and immediately knocked up the wives they’d left behind. They forthrightly set back the women’s labor movement by making factory workers and teachers into homemakers, creating the new “nuclear family” and the Baby Boomers. Together, those two generations of our grandparents have given us neoliberalism, student loans, the prison-industrial complex, and globalization.
This year that date is September 11! We salute you, grandparents!
Opening Day, Any Major League Sport
Our major league sports teams are the well-paid glue that both holds our nation of rabid tribalist fanatics together, and tears it asunder. The next opening day is the NFL’s, September 8. Patriot Colin Kaepernick is a Scorpio, but he doesn’t get to throw the ball until September 12 — three days after mighty Jupiter leaves his house of friendship. Let’s not bail on Colin, symbol of American freedoms.
October 25 is the NBA’s Opening Day, and the Warriors (uniforms!) clash against the Spurs (uniform accessories!) in Oakland for the title of Cuban Missile Crisis Day/Invasion of Grenada Day Champs.
Black Friday (The Friday after the Fourth Thursday in November, AKA Thanksgiving)
Our uniformed personnel — cashiers, greeters, toll takers, security guards, and cops — are out in full force on Black Friday, defending this monumental celebration of capitalism. The tired, poor, and huddled masses camp out in order to be able to afford not to skip Christmas this year, buying televisions and talking toys on the one day of the year they can meet the list price without layaway. Meanwhile, our service men and women show up to make enough extra hours to cover their health insurance bills that month, skip the Thanksgiving Dinners no one really wants to go to anyway, and prevent the thefts of valor that occur during multifamily brawls.
This year Black Friday falls on November 24, the day the Texas Rangers were founded in 1835 to protect the great Republic of Texas and round up fugitive Indian and Mexican insurgents.
Easter (The first Sunday after the Full Moon that falls on or after Spring Equinox)
Easter is the sequel to Good Friday, the day on which Roman Soldiers crucified our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, stabbed him with a spear to make sure he was dead, and divided up his clothing among them, casting lots for his coveted seamless gown. On Easter, our hero waited for the soldiers to take a cigarette break and then rolled the rock out from in front of his own tomb, escaping to heaven in one of the greatest foot-chase scenes in ancient cinema.
In 2017, Easter Sunday falls on April 16. On that day in 1944, the Allies began bombing Belgrade. On this date in 1961, Fidel Castro declared Communism for Cuba. Saludo!
Feast Day of St. Joan of Arc (May 30)
Child soldier Joan of Arc helped lead our French allies to victory over the English during several battles of the Hundred Years’ War. She was stricken with signs and visions, shot in the neck by an arrow, took a crossbow bolt to the leg, seized by traitors and imprisoned in a castle, and denied a lawyer by the Burgundian Inquisitors. The charges against Joan for heresy against God couldn’t be proven due to her astonishing philosophical (read: pagan) charms, so she was convicted for crossdressing and burned at the stake on May 30, re-burned twice, and her ashes were thrown in the Seine.
Posthumously, it was confirmed by monks that Joan insisted on wearing men’s clothing in prison because pants and belts made it more difficult for the military guard to rape her.
Summer 2017 starts with Memorial Day on May 29, so at midnight precisely, the cusp of these two important dates, strike a match in memory of old Joan.
Tarin Towers writes about witchcraft, guns, and basketball, among other things. Visit her at tarintowers.com and subscribe to her newsletter, Displacement Blues.
