We attended a Last Post this time in Belgium — Menin Gate, Ypres, West Flanders — and visited a few cemeteries. It was too early for any poppies, if in fact they bloom there. Australians were there for the ceremony. Held in a huge triumphal arch. Trumpets, wreaths, marching every night.

In the cemeteries, the English Empire graves were orderly; the German Empire less so. It probably meant the world to my grandfather, but we have seen so much worse since that bitter family squabble.

We got there a bit late to get great standing room, and it was packed without much masking. Many of the older people let the school children get ahead for a better view to carry the memory forward further than any of us can.