TAMPA, Fla. — This Memorial Day the families who lost the people closest to them want to remind people of what the day is truly about. They say with countless gatherings and ceremonies happening all over, it’s easy to forget the true meaning and the lives of those brave men and women who gave their lives for their country.

Being able to honor her late father, Rudolph Rogers Sr., is what brought Nannette Rogers out to the annual Crisp Memorial Day ceremony.

“My father passed away in 1968 of an illness when I was two years old. He was in the army. He was a sergeant, and he got sick very suddenly and he didn’t live very long after that,” she said.

Rogers, along with dozens of others, gathered at The Gold Star Family’s Memorial Monument at MacDill Park in Tampa.

“It’s an honor that our family members are not forgotten. That we place a wreath, we put a flag out for them,” she said.

Rogers says she learned a few years ago that even though her father didn’t die in combat, they’re still a gold star family. An honor she cherishes.

“We remember their names. We say their names. We talk about their life and how they lived and the courage that it took to say, I’ll go,” Rogers said. “Here I am, Lord, send me. And it takes a brave person to run to the battle.”

That’s what makes military veteran, Frank Oliver, proud to be a veteran this Memorial Day.

“It’s not today. It’s every day,” he said. “It’s not only Memorial Day. It’s veterans’ day. It’s the birth of the Airforce day. It’s the end of the end of the war in Vietnam, April the 8th, 1975. Or 73’ when I left the war and went to Thailand. The day I got to Saigon the first time.”

Oliver has generations of his family wearing that same badge of honor.

“24 in my family served,” he said. “From my granddaddy all the way to my grandson, who just graduated from Riverview. He’s in the marines now at Camp Lejeune. So, we’re a military family.”

Family and honoring those who paid the ultimate price. That’s what Rogers says she hopes everyone remembers this Memorial Day.

“For those that are still learning what the holiday means, it is to remember, to honor and respect those who have served in our military and died and remember those who are currently serving because we don’t at any time, they may be called upon to defend our freedoms again,” she said.