Yesterday, like towns large and small all across America, Webster celebrated Memorial Day with a parade and a beautiful ceremony at Webster Rural Cemetery. The weather was gorgeous, there were tons of people lining the streets with their folding chairs and blankets, there were lots and lots of flags and patriotic shirts, and the parade sported sharp marching units, the always impressive Webster Marching Band, fire trucks, Boy Scouts and Brownies, and lots more. The ceremony following the parade was moving and Taps made people cry.
At least I ASSUME that all happened yesterday, because for the first time in a long time I was not able to attend the day’s festivities. I was out of town with my daughter, visiting my father in Greene, NY, a little town north of Binghamton. But I dare say, if I couldn’t be in Webster for the parade, being in Greene was a pretty good second.
If you’ve never been in Greene, picture Webster, but smaller. It’s a quiet little village of about 2,000 people, tucked in a valley along the Chenango River. Its downtown about 2 blocks long, and cars park in the middle of the street. They’ve got tree-lined sidewalks, an old five-and-dime shop, a couple of diner-type restaurants, and historical markers on pretty much every corner.
And they have a Memorial Day parade.
I was very excited to find out that I could see a parade, since I was missing the one at home. So yesterday morning at 10 am, when Webster’s parade was just ending, my father, daughter and I were standing on Main Street in Greene, watching for their town’s parade to begin. We had gotten there a few minutes early to find a spot, but we needn’t have worried. Even though the parade would stretch for only about half a mile, there were plenty of empty places to stand. And we didn’t worry about setting up chairs, either, since we’d heard from several people that the parade wasn’t very substantial. I believe the way my brother-in-law put it was “Don’t blink.”
But they had nothing to be embarrassed about. It was a nice little parade that oozed small-town charm. Sure, there were only seven or eight units, and it lasted all of 12 minutes (including five minutes when the whole parade paused for a wreath-placing ceremony). But the fact it wasn’t an hour-long spectacular didn’t seem to matter to the veterans who marched with fierce pride, the high school band members who played their hearts out, and the Scouts who waved and grinned broadly, clearly enjoying their brief time in the spotlight.
I took a lot of photos (of course), so if you’re at all interested in seeing what another small-town parade looks like, click HERE or on any of the images to go to a gallery.
webster on the web 
Leave a comment