War , Capitalism and the Air Show

Sitting in front of my computer I can hear the sound of many airplanes screaming over the city. It has been going on for hours. Every year in Toronto for over a century I believe we have the Canadian National Exhibition from mid August to the end of labour day(that disgusting substitute for May Day )and has many memories for me. And every year in the last week they have the Air Show. I can hear them practicing their choreographed dances in the air now.
I grew up in a small town about 50 kilometres east of Toronto.Just about every year my Mom and Dad would take a vacation for 2 days-their only vacations ever and attend the CNE. We did not go because this was their "time together." But we eagerly awaited their return , their arms full of stuffed animals won at the arcades and special treats like a whole box of bubble gum-never allowed any other time of the year.
As an adult I generally attend every year as a member of the labour day parade where all participants get in free at the end-the last day of the CNE.
After we were grown my Mom and Dad only attended once -to see the Air Show. It was a special treat for my Dad, who was in the RCAF during WW2. My Dad hated that war and we heard very little from him about it except the story of his 72 hours in a dinghy in the North Sea after his plane went down. He was reported lost at sea and it was an odd fluke that after this long time they were spotted and picked up and taken to London.
Other frequent references to this time were hints I heard as a child that "the war changed Dad." Yet just once he attended the air show -quite a sight and very beautiful in a very eerie way. Planes choreographed beautiful exercises and formations in the sky and he was watched and i could see mixed emotions on his face. I wondered at that time what emotions he experienced watching this and how much of those emotions could never be known by me, simply because I had never been to war or experienced war directly. There are few veterans of this ugly war left to hear the planes going over Toronto every 5-10 minutes, practicing for the show, but it makes me wonder what those still alive think when they hear these sounds. And it makes me want to cry a little-when I think of how many working people and children have heard those sounds, and shuddered in fear, children in Palestine and Israel today who hear these sounds and the sounds of rockets coming close -yet still must go about daily living-where does the fear go inside and outside, and the confusion and anger?
It makes me think of one day when I was sitting with an Israeli Canadian woman co-worker outside the womens shelter where I was working one Labour Day weekend. It was a hot day and we were chatting with the clients when the planes went over as they are right now. She began to shake and covered her ears and ran inside crying-flash backs she told me much later triggered by her life in Israel. This memory has stayed with me .
More than any veterans day could ever do these sounds the week before Labour Day, the last week of the CNE, always make me reflect on the horrors of capitalism and all the wars they have created and the millions they have killed for profit-thats all just profit.