This Memorial Day, I’m Thinking About What I’ve Never Had to Give

Memorial Day weekend is here, and I want to share something from my heart.

Human Authored by

Daniel Goodwin

I love my country.

I’ve said that out loud and meant it every time. I built Provident 1031 and Provident Wealth Advisors from the ground up: long days, long years, working through markets that punished mistakes and rewarded patience. Most mornings, I’m still at it before the sun’s up. Building a business in Texas, hiring people, paying them well, helping clients keep more of what they’ve earned, that’s a life I’m proud of.

But here’s what I want to be honest about this weekend.

I have never been asked to put my life on the line for anyone. Not for a stranger. Not for a country. Not for a person I’d never meet who would benefit from what I did.

Memorial Day isn’t Veterans Day. I want to be careful about that. Veterans Day honors everyone who served. The Fourth of July celebrates the country itself. Memorial Day is something narrower and heavier: it’s the day we set aside for the men and women who didn’t come home. The ones who, in Lincoln’s phrase, gave the last full measure of devotion. The ones who never got to build a business, raise a family, or watch a grandkid play baseball on a Saturday morning.

I’ve gotten to do all of that.

I think about Houston National Cemetery sometimes and those rows of white headstones off Veterans Memorial Drive, more than a hundred thousand graves at last count. Each one of them was somebody who decided that something — a country, a unit, a person, an idea — was worth dying for.

Not in the abstract. Actually dying for.

I cannot honestly tell you I know what that takes. I’ve worked hard. I’ve taken financial risks. I’ve stayed up nights worrying about deals that were going sideways. None of that is the same… not even close.

The honest thing to say on Memorial Day is just this: I’m in awe of the people who made that choice, and I’m grateful for them every day I get to do what I love in a country that gave me the chance. That’s it. I don’t have anything more eloquent than that, and I don’t think I should try.

If you’re reading this and you’ve lost someone who served — a spouse, a parent, a son or daughter, a sibling, a friend — please know that whatever I’ve built, whatever any of us in The Woodlands or Houston or anywhere else have built, we built it on top of what your person gave up. We don’t say that often enough.

This Monday I’m going to take some quiet time. Maybe drive out to the cemetery. Maybe just sit on the back porch and think about it.

Whatever you do this weekend — barbecue with the family, head to the lake, take the kids somewhere — take a minute too.

Talk to you next week.
— Dan