Seven years in
In years past, I have recounted on this journal what I was doing on that fateful day, the Pearl Harbor of my generation. I'm not going to, not this time.
You see, I am twenty-two years old, and one-third of my life ago, an event occurred that shook the entire world. An event which continues to reverberate unto this day, with remembrances even on the floor of Wall Street; to watch the greatest collection of loud mouths in the world standing in utter silence. To listen to never ending litanies of names elsewhere in New York City. To watch a memorial finished after seven years at the Pentagon. To still see in my mind's eye, not burning buildings, not airplanes, but those whose final jump was caught in a single still frame of photography.
Seven years ago, an event caused unprecedented unity amongst the people of not only the United States of America, but also amongst the world. Ninety-eight separate countries lost its citizens on that day. Seven years later, we have all but forgotten as the nation is at its most divided since the dark days of the mass riots of the 60s and 70s; since the strings of assassinations.
The day Congress returned to work a junior congressman broke into God Bless America, and the rest joined in. Now, if one were to do that, someone would accuse him of being "Too red state". It would case yet another divisive firestorm. We have fallen so far from the unity we enjoyed in our shell shock, we have become petty bickering children.
It's funny the things we remember; I can remember the days after 9/11 with clarity, all the aspects of them. I can remember the day itself with clarity. I can remember walking into school the next day, and the silence that so pervaded it, and would continue to until people walked in with the news that Kabul had fallen.
Despite my chastisement of bickering engulfing the nation as rival groups try to paint each other as Servants of Satan, now is not the time to dwell on our differences. It is a time to remember those who died, those who escaped, those who still have the post traumatic stress of that day. It is the time to remember we are greater together than apart, that democracy continues to live as long as we do not forsake the very freedoms that were part of what made us a target.
While I realize some of my readers may disapprove of it, just a small prayer:
Lord, grant us the strength to persevere as a nation, and grant unto those who died Your mercy. They were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
http://liz-marcs.livejournal.com/206303.html Liz Marcs has an old entry that is quite apt, about 9/11 and Pearl Harbor. A story of a newspaper journalist, his interview of a woman who was a 13 year old girl at Pearl Harbor. Then the realization of how that girl felt by the reporter on that day when his world radically changed.
P.S. This is going to be a very rare public entry.
You see, I am twenty-two years old, and one-third of my life ago, an event occurred that shook the entire world. An event which continues to reverberate unto this day, with remembrances even on the floor of Wall Street; to watch the greatest collection of loud mouths in the world standing in utter silence. To listen to never ending litanies of names elsewhere in New York City. To watch a memorial finished after seven years at the Pentagon. To still see in my mind's eye, not burning buildings, not airplanes, but those whose final jump was caught in a single still frame of photography.
Seven years ago, an event caused unprecedented unity amongst the people of not only the United States of America, but also amongst the world. Ninety-eight separate countries lost its citizens on that day. Seven years later, we have all but forgotten as the nation is at its most divided since the dark days of the mass riots of the 60s and 70s; since the strings of assassinations.
The day Congress returned to work a junior congressman broke into God Bless America, and the rest joined in. Now, if one were to do that, someone would accuse him of being "Too red state". It would case yet another divisive firestorm. We have fallen so far from the unity we enjoyed in our shell shock, we have become petty bickering children.
It's funny the things we remember; I can remember the days after 9/11 with clarity, all the aspects of them. I can remember the day itself with clarity. I can remember walking into school the next day, and the silence that so pervaded it, and would continue to until people walked in with the news that Kabul had fallen.
Despite my chastisement of bickering engulfing the nation as rival groups try to paint each other as Servants of Satan, now is not the time to dwell on our differences. It is a time to remember those who died, those who escaped, those who still have the post traumatic stress of that day. It is the time to remember we are greater together than apart, that democracy continues to live as long as we do not forsake the very freedoms that were part of what made us a target.
While I realize some of my readers may disapprove of it, just a small prayer:
Lord, grant us the strength to persevere as a nation, and grant unto those who died Your mercy. They were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
http://liz-marcs.livejournal.com/206303.html Liz Marcs has an old entry that is quite apt, about 9/11 and Pearl Harbor. A story of a newspaper journalist, his interview of a woman who was a 13 year old girl at Pearl Harbor. Then the realization of how that girl felt by the reporter on that day when his world radically changed.
P.S. This is going to be a very rare public entry.