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Two years ago, when the idea of repatriating the body of a Canadian soldier was first suggested at a Royal Canadian Legion meeting looking for ways to celebrate the new millennium, any crowd at all would have been welcomed, and a bit of a surprise. Ironically, it was Chuck Murphy, president of the Royal Canadian Legion, who spearheaded the campaign to have a Tomb of the Unknown Soldier erected in front of Canada's War Memorial. Mr. Murphy died in his hotel room on Thursday, apparently of a heart attack, the day he returned to Canada with the body of the Unknown Soldier. He was 66. To die on the evening that your life's dream and mission is completed -- there is something so tragic and poetic in that, something so classical, you wouldn't dare use it in a modern short story for fear of being labelled dishonest. And yet it happened. And for those who knew Mr. Murphy -- and how hard he had lobbied for the creation of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and how he had dreamed that it might ignite a passion in this country, might stir some emotion and action that went beyond obligatory poppy-wearing in November --for those who knew all that -- they must have imagined Mr. Murphy smiling heartily yesterday. Because the streets of downtown Ottawa were filled with those who had come to pay final respects to the Unknown Soldier. There were young and old. People dressed in military uniforms and people dressed in cargo pants. There was no uniformity to the crowd, and that was odd. I've been in many crowds before and there's usually a theme to it, but in this one, there was none. If it is a cliché to have a man die on the day he has completed his life's mission, than perhaps it is also a cliché to have the crowd that comes to pay tribute to Canada's Unknown Soldier as diverse as the country itself. But once again, it happened. And that crowd did the most amazing thing. Right from the start, when the casket of the Unknown Soldier was taken down the steps of the Centre Block and then loaded onto the horse-drawn gun carriage that would take him to his final resting place at the foot of the War Memorial, that young-old-rich-poor-black-white crowd did the most amazing thing. There was an almost palpable silence from the crowd when the flag-draped casket rolled by. And then, when the first row of veterans came walking along behind the casket, someone in the crowd would invariably start to clap. And then a couple more people would join in. Then a few more, until very soon there were waves of clapping, thunderous clapping that at times became as raucous as the clapping at a sporting event, a sustained ovation as row after row of veterans passed by behind the casket. Many of those veterans had tears in their eyes long before they reached the Memorial. During her eulogy, Gov. Gen. Adrienne Clarkson paid further tribute to the veterans, saying: "We have a wealth of witnesses in Canada to describe to us the unspeakable horror and frightening maelstrom that war brings." As she spoke, not 20 metres away sat Paul Metivier, a Nepean man who fought at Vimy Ridge in the First World War. Prime Minister Jean Chretien spoke next and said: "Today, a nation gratefully remembers the sacrifices of the past," and went on to say the Unknown Soldier "is Canada's lost son no more." Army Chaplain Murray Farwell, who escorted the body of the Unknown Soldier back from France, spoke next, and he began with the words: "There is a season for everything." I was struck by the truth of that, as I had been struck by his earlier reference, at Vimy Ridge, to the "pilgrimage" that the body of the Unknown Soldier was about to undertake. To every season. Laughter and then tears. Birth and then death. One extreme to another. The Unknown Soldier was buried in his boots and his gas mask, just another body hurriedly put under the ground of northern France during the First World War, but he would return to a hero's welcome nearly 90 years later, his funeral attended by the prime minister and the Governor General. Chuck Murphy would die wondering whether the Unknown Soldier would matter to many people. Three days later, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier would became one of our most important national symbols. Nearly 20,000 people would come to a funeral in Ottawa, while all around us the trees and bushes of the War Memorial and Parliament Hill would be in full, late-spring bloom, new life so prevalent around us it was almost smothering. There is a season for everything. The ceremony ended with the Canadian flag I saw draped around the casket in Vimy Ridge being removed and meticulously folded, then the casket of the Unknown Soldier being lowered into the tomb. Near the end of all that, there was also a fly-by. It was called the missing man formation fly-by, and it seemed to symbolize everything that had happened this past week, and how the story of the Unknown Soldier seemed to take off and touch people in unexpected ways. Four planes flew over the War Memorial, and as they passed, one plane just took off in an exponential arc, soaring for the sky as the other three planes continued travelling in a straight line. The lone plane soared and arced until it passed through a cloud and disappeared. A shudder went through the crowd after seeing that. Ten seconds later a bird was circling the spot in the sky where the plane had disappeared. There is a season for everything.
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