By Jess Bell

Every year on Veteran’s Day, when family, friends, and strangers alike thank me for my service, they mean service in the past tense. I’m proud of my fourteen years in the Marine Corps. I look forward to the day when my daughters ask me, “Mom, why did you decide to join the Marines?” I will tell them that I felt called to fulfill my duty as a citizen, to sacrifice for the larger good.

But I will also tell them that my service to my country didn’t stop when I took off my uniform; nor did its essence fundamentally change.

I am among the fewer than one percent of Americans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan. Our mission was to protect the national security of the United States. But my fellow Marines and I did much more than that. We tried to help rebuild a nation, albeit in difficult and sometimes impossible circumstances. We provided humanitarian aid. We did our best to set an example before the world and reflect a nation committed to a set of ideals.

The importance of sacrificing for the wellbeing of our country is instilled in every member of the military, and it stays with us. Since leaving the Marines, I have felt the need to continue to serve. I am a founding member of Impact100 Oakland County, a community of women who award high-impact grants to nonprofits in our county. I also joined Veterans for American Ideals, a nonpartisan group that advocates for refugees, speaks out against Islamophobia, and works to help Iraqis and Afghans who served with us to find refuge in the United States.

And for more than seven months, I have had the honor of supporting a family of refugees as they adjust to their new home in Detroit after a decade of life in a refugee camp in Chad. Recently, I helped plan and host a baby shower for the family’s eldest daughter, whose newborn will be a first-generation American citizen.

It was a joyous occasion. As a mother, I loved celebrating with this mom-to-be, knowing that she will be able to raise her daughter in safety and provide her with opportunities that she herself has never known. That is what we all want for our children. My helping this family felt like a natural extension of the oath I took as a veteran: to support and defend the U.S. Constitution—and the very ideals that make America a beacon for people around the world.

On Veterans Day, as always, it is fitting and important to thank veterans and their families for the sacrifices they’ve willingly made. Equally important, especially after such an ugly campaign season, is to remember that it is the responsibility not only of veterans to protect and vitalize American democracy. This responsibility belongs to us all.

It has been a brutal few months; we are more divided than at any other time in my memory. And we have allowed ourselves to drift from many of our foundational values. With the election behind us, we must come together again. We must remember who we are. 

We are a nation of rich ethnic, cultural, racial, and religious diversity. We are a nation that welcomes “the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” We are a nation that cares for our neighbors.

Those are the ideals that called me to put on the uniform, and that I teach my daughters through my own continued service. Today, please don’t simply thank veterans for our service; find a way to carry out your mission of service. Join us in living our values at home.

Jessica Utter Bell is a U.S. Marine Corps Veteran who served as an Electronic Countermeasures Officer in Iraq.  She is a leader with Veterans for American Ideals, a non-partisan group of veterans founded by Human Rights First and committed to continued service in support of American ideals.