For some, Memorial Day is the unofficial start of summer. I know I have been taking advantage of the warm weather and feeling how the summer heat burns away through winter depression and doubt. Others, take the day, a holiday set aside to remember those who have lost their lives in the name of the United States. I have flipped through the television watching flags placed on the graves of fallen soldiers.

I count myself as among the somewhat lucky, that with a few family members in the military, I have not lost anyone. So maybe that’s why my memorial day will not be the same as yours. My mind will not wrap itself in red white and blue when so many soldiers who die do so because they were promised a piece of ownership over the U.S. flag via coveted citizenship or residence for their familias.

I will light candles for los muertos hoy, pero I do that everyday. Maybe of equal importance is lighting candles for those who are still alive and struggling with the choices that appear before them. Today, Free Speech Radio News is highlighting a report that they did on military recruitment in Brooklyn. Hearing young people of color speak about how their options are presented to them is nothing new for me. I, like the youth featured in the report, see military recruiters in the busy subway stations. I walk by, holding my three year old daughter’s hand, feeling a little more than helpless as a mouth “don’t do it” to the young people being sweet talked. I make loud comments as I walk to catch my train to work about how youth are being manipulated.

My Memorial Day will not be the same as yours. I think of people defending ideals not flags. Today’s muertos include those killed in the Flotilla bringing humanitarian aid including medical supplies to Gaza. I am writing this with a huge sense of open mouthed, disgusted shock at how a country can claim self-defense when murdering in open, international waters, as if gauze and syringes are a threat to national sovereignty.

Today I think of the sovereignty and freedom of my own little family and my extended families and how we got to where we are, how much of it was not via acts of free will but rather via the acts of free markets and their impact on how we work and eat.

My memorial day will not, cannot be the same as yours.