Royal Canadian Legion's Silver Cross Mother Sheila Anderson places a wreath during the Remembrance Day ceremony in Ottawa on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
Sheila Anderson admits she was "a little overwhelmed" as she faced the National War Memorial with Governor-General David Johnston to her left, surrounded by tens of thousands of people who had turned out for the annual tribute to Canada's war dead.
But Ms. Anderson, the 2015 Silver Cross Mother who travelled from Yellowknife with her husband James to represent all Canadian mothers who have lost children in the service of their country, says she also felt comforted by the warmth of the Remembrance Day crowd. She felt support, too, from the members of the Royal Canadian Legion who had brought her to that place.
When she walked straight and tall, although aided by a cane, to lay her wreath before the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, she said her thoughts went to her son, Jordan, an army corporal who was killed with five other soldiers and an interpreter in July, 2007, when their vehicle ran over a roadside bomb in Afghanistan.
"And they went to all the parents who suffered a loss as well," she said Wednesday after the ceremony had ended, her voice continually giving way to emotion. "The pain never goes away. But the opportunity to talk about him, and have him be honoured, is wonderful too."
Ms. Anderson is the first Silver Cross Mother the Legion has chosen from the Northwest Territories.
Jordan Anderson was born in what is now Iqaluit, Nunavut, and lived much of his pre-army life in the North. He was 27 and a few weeks from returning home at the end of his second deployment to Afghanistan when his life ended in one of the largest explosions the NATO forces had experienced to that point in the conflict.
"He was very curious and he was argumentative and opinionated, but the reason for those things was because he was very well read," Ms. Anderson said. "His grandmother on my side used to tell him that he was a wealth of useless information. In truth, he actually learned what he wanted to learn in order to get ahead so he never gave up studying. He kept doing that even though he went into the army."
Jordan Anderson was just one credit shy of finishing his bachelors degree in history and political science at the University of Manitoba when he was killed; the university awarded it to him posthumously. He intended to get a masters degree in strategic studies and then become an intelligence officer.
His married his wife, Amanda, in 2005. She was the first to get the call to say he would not be coming home.
"She phoned us and just gave the phone to the assisting officer and the assisting officer told us of Jordan's death," Ms. Anderson said. Other officers, who had been searching for her home, showed up a short time later.
"So we've had lots of support and really good treatment from the army," she said. And she has felt the figurative embrace of people from all across the country. "Canadians," said Ms. Anderson, "believe in supporting each other in tough times and this is no exception."
In a written message found by his wife after his death, Jordan Anderson said that he was not afraid to die, that he knew what he was doing was right, and that, if the worst happened, "I know it won't be for nothing."
But Ms. Anderson said she believes it is important to use her position as Silver Cross Mother to remind Canadians that war is not the only solution to conflict.
"Killing each other has never solved anything. War should be at the bottom of the list of solutions to difficulties between countries, between factions. The price is too great," she said. "And, just because a person's dead doesn't mean the suffering for them is over because their families have to live on."