Memorial Day: What (and Who) Are We Really Remembering?

he last Monday of May rolls in every year with flags, BBQs, furniture sales, and the language of sacrifice.

But Memorial Day is more than a long weekend. It’s supposed to be a day of collective remembrance. A moment to honor lives lost in military service.

So why does it feel like we’re all being asked to forget?

The Problem with Patriotism-as-Performance

Memorial Day, like so many national holidays, has been commercialized into something hollow. Red, white, and blue napkins. Discounted mattresses. Politicians tweeting flag emojis while actively harming the communities those lost lives were supposed to protect.

And let’s be real: the “freedoms” we’re told to be thankful for don’t exist equally for everyone. Especially not for the marginalized, the silenced, or the systemically oppressed.

We’re told to remember—but only what fits the script.

What About the Rest of Us?

What about the queer soldier who had to hide who they were?
The Black veteran denied benefits after serving?
The mother who lost her child to war and to the country’s neglect?

What about the civilians who carry trauma, the communities torn apart by policies made far from their homes, the ones we don’t talk about because they don’t make for good patriotic branding?

I think about this often. And I can’t help but feel that if we’re going to talk about memory, we need to do it honestly.

How This Ties Into My Work

As I begin my protest portrait of Trump, I’m thinking deeply about symbols:
Flags that fray.
Eagles that glare.
Gold that flakes.
The way power tries to wear the mask of virtue.

Memorial Day will be folded into this piece—because this painting isn’t just about one man. It’s about the rot beneath our rituals. The beauty that still exists despite the betrayal. The way grief, when unacknowledged, curdles into rage.

Beauty in Decay is how I process that duality.
It’s how I remember on my own terms.

Reclaiming the Act of Remembering

What if Memorial Day was more than just patriotic pageantry?

What if we made room for complexity?
For mourning and critique?
For remembering the people who aren’t named in speeches but who deserve to be honored anyway?

This May, I’m holding space for all of it. The grief, the anger, the beauty. The complexity of remembrance. The discomfort of truth.

And I’ll be painting through it—because sometimes, remembering is an act of resistance.