For most of us, Memorial Day is the unofficial start of summer. The first long weekend. The first cookout, the first beach day, the first boat day of the season here in Southwest Florida.

But before the burgers and the sunshine, it's worth pausing on what the day actually asks of us.

Memorial Day is not Veterans Day. Veterans Day thanks those who served and came home. Memorial Day remembers those who did not. It is a day for the fallen — the men and women who left home in uniform and never walked back through the door.

We spend our days in the business of homes. We help families find the place where their lives will happen — where children will grow up, where holidays will be hosted, where ordinary Tuesday evenings quietly become the memories that matter most.

That work makes us think, especially today, about the homes with an empty chair. The families across Southwest Florida — and across this country — who set one less place at the table because someone they loved gave everything so the rest of us could come home safely to ours.

Every freedom we exercise without a second thought — including the quiet, profound freedom to own a piece of this country and call it home — was paid for by someone. Some of them paid the whole price.

This Memorial Day carries a little extra weight. 2026 marks 250 years since this nation declared itself free. Two and a half centuries of that freedom, defended in every single generation, by people whose names most of us will never know.

I've had the privilege — and it is a privilege — of standing in some of the places where that price is most visible. I walked the Normandy American Cemetery in 1990, on the bluffs above the beaches where so many never made it past the sand. I've visited Arlington several times, and Calverton National Cemetery on Long Island many times more. Just two months ago, my son Stephen and his wife Emily made their own trip to Normandy — a reminder that remembering is something we hand down, one generation to the next.

I'll tell you this: it is overwhelming every single time. You stand before row after row after row of white markers — each one a name, each one a life, each one a family that received the news no family ever wants. The scale of it does not shrink with repeat visits. If anything, it grows.

That is what these hallowed places do. They don't let you take freedom for granted. They make you feel the weight of it.

So today, we're not going to talk about the market. Not interest rates, not inventory, not anything we'd normally write about.

We're just going to say thank you.

To the fallen — we remember you.

To the families who carry the loss — we see you, and we are grateful beyond words.

To everyone who has ever worn the uniform — thank you for making it possible for the rest of us to build our lives, and our homes, in peace.

From all of us at the Hawley Team — we hope you have a meaningful and reflective Memorial Day.