Last year I read a book called The Return, a memoir written by Hisham Matar, a Libyan author who had been long-removed from his home country. In the book he returns with his American wife in 2012, and the book recounts the experience of tracing his father’s fate as well as witnessing what has become of his country. Like the Libya he once knew, his father is forever gone. But Matar in his description offers each loss a sort of loving immortality. The book is simultaneously beautiful, difficult and disquieting in its content. On a personal level, I found it compelling because I identified strongly with his battery of emotions that accompanied recontact with emotions of visceral familiarity. 

It was a summer evening in 2009 on the first night that I slept under the roof of a new friend’s home in northern Virginia. I was in the guest bedroom on the second floor, but the single-family house built back in the 1930s was the kind offering an upstairs that was essentially a vaulted ceiling split in two by a dividing wall. I lay prone in a slightly bent position in order to fit on the daybed while gazing down on the fading light as it illuminated the exposed edges of the wooden floors. They were the sort that, over the years, had taken on a dull sheen but also rendered invitingly smooth by so many grateful footsteps. And since it was summer in the National Capital Region, I of course had the window open– the screen long-since installed at the turn of springtime by my very detail-minded host. The open window was now perfect because it facilitated a breeze with a soundtrack almost as refreshing as the air flow itself.

And on this first night, I lay in bed still feeling a little restless. My suitcase had exploded all over the floor in such a way that I would have to beachcomb for misplaced items like my Garmin watch or my Road iD. My body communicated a soreness that was a physical manifestation from the mental battery that I’d endured over the preceding weeks. But still, I relished this evening where I knew that I was at last under the watchful eye of someone else. Even though that room was temporary refuge, it still very much felt like I could not have been better sheltered. 

Outside beyond the screen window and before the gunmetal blue of the changing sky, my ears picked at the sound of the wind with gentle ease. It would be nearly nighttime. And just then, the evensong of Arlington was suddenly broken by the slow but prodding call of a single bugle. I recognized what I was hearing right away. Retreat. A familiar dirge drifting in from a place that sounded quite near but was somehow just out of sight from where I lay. Retreat is a mournful call but it is also one that directs us all to a definitive rest.  Evening colors, as we call it in my line of work. And I should not have been surprised to suddenly hear the tune from within that guest bedroom. The roof under which I was a privileged guest was positioned only steps away from the Fort Myer Army Base.

As a small child, I always loved this precise moment: finding myself placed between thin blankets on a warm summer’s evening. Given the long summer light on Cape Cod, it always felt as though I was in bed rather early—but all the same it was a relegation that I gladly accepted. I liked it because not only did it mean that everything in the preceding day was finished, but, more notably, there was unparalleled comfort in that exact frame of environment. The insects in their nighttime activity wove perfectly in with the wind weaving through the leaves. My only job in that moment was to listen. Nothing else for me to do but simply attend to the environment until I slipped from consciousness while knowing that I was wrapped in a confine of security. Now, as an adult, I once again felt this on that second floor in Arlington, Virginia. It was a return to an experience I had misplaced. It was one that I had not anticipated, but most certainly welcomed.

I think about that rediscovered return to security more frequently than you would imagine. As you go through life, it becomes more infrequent to find yourself occupying a space where you feel completely secure, completely taken care of. Like someone else has the watch and you can trust the rest of the world and just let go. And I think about this too on this May weekend when we remember to look up from what we’re doing and reflect on those who have passed while in service to the country. Retreat. Permanent rest and comfort. And profound appreciation.

And now for me, starting this year, each May I’ll experience an added element of mournful reflection. I say this because that bugler has called its Arlington neighbor—my friend who kept me under her roof, the one who that following winter still housed me and dug my car out from under the Snowpocalypse—called her away to an early and permanent retreat. While it may be Memorial Day, I find that memory and gratitude for those providing comfort are not limited to those earning little American flags that dot a major city’s public park. Someone’s Libyan father, someone’s marathoning friend who acted like a mom to so many people—each person in supporting another represents something of greater importance.

I often claim that I’ve forgotten more things than I will ever experience in whatever remains of my life. But perhaps not every souvenir and sensation is truly forgotten. Memories, I’ve found, are sometimes deeply embedded and lay dormant for many years. And so I find it heartening to know that these misplaced yet cherished moments can be suddenly snapped into the present experience. All is well. Safely rest. And with this, I know that I’m perpetually surrounded by the brave and selfless humans who have passed on but still retain a powerful presence. Folks who will no longer hear Retreat out their bedroom window but hopefully rest easy knowing that their legacy is carried forward. To be honored. And Loved. And always remembered.