The phrase "lest we forget" is usually spoken in terms of "don't forget what was sacrificed for your freedom", talking about the human costs of war.
I don't think many people know it originally from the Rudyard Kipling poem that took its echoes from a passage in Deuteronomy: "don't forget what God has done before your eyes, for you and your children's children".
And the word 'freedom' itself is a slippery word, like a tame bear, meant to dance to whatever beat the ringmaster chooses. Mostly it seems to be used to mean "I can do anything I want without recourse to anyone I consider lesser than me", which is really the old adage of "freedom for the master, but not for the slave". My sense of freedom includes those who are socially, physically, mentally lesser than me; if they don't have the freedom to act, neither do I. I am they, and they are me, but for the randomicity of where I was born, who I was born to, what gifts I was given.
I love my life, I'm so grateful for everything I have. I've made much WITH it, but so much more of it was GIVEN to me by the grace of God (or random chance for my atheists/agnostics). And yes, I do a lot of things - I live like I'm running out of time (to misquote the lyrics of 'Hamilton'), because we are running out of time. Today, next week, next year, next decade, next century: our number eventually comes up.
"Death and taxes" goes the old joke. I don't mind death, although I'd like it to be fast and as painless as possible. And I have no objection to taxes, which I consider a reminder to do unto others as I would have others do unto me. And, which I pay gladly, because I actually believe in a society that doesn't just mouth the words "equality of humanity" but actually acts on it insofar as we are able, and I'm willing to put my money where my heart is. (Same reason I tithe to churches, and give to charities.)
I can't give others the security of family they can trust, the physical health and drive that I enjoy (slowly eroding with age), the bodily integrity that I was granted by the men and women around me, the society that I was born into where I am a person with legal rights and the right to legal independence, the faith that assures me I am a reflection of the image of God. It's not within my power to change those random throws - only to point out that it's random. But it is within my power to level the playing field where possible. To enable those swept off their feet by circumstance the financial space to find their feet. To enable those who have no feet to manoeuvre their wheelchair into the same spaces that I do.
