Reading of the Names

Names are important. 

We spend months choosing just the right ones for our children.  We long to hear our own names whispered from those who love us.  We look the ones we ourselves love in the eye and speak their names so that they may hear it.  These names feel so at home in our mouths, on our tongues, our lips.  This is more than saying, "I love you."  It is saying, I love YOU.  Specifically, you. 

Today, more than 3,000 names will be spoken. 

Each name will spill forth from a living soul, sent out into the world on a breath of life borrowed from another.

Each name, so much more than a name. 

Each name representing a man, a woman, a child, the loved ones left behind, the holes left in hearts and lives.

Each name representing a life. 

We say, "Never forget."  We say, "I remember where I was..."

Speak the names. 

Speak the names of those lost.  Speak the names of those you love. 

Yell them, spill them out with a laugh, whisper them, call them, cry them.

But don't stop saying their names.