“Let us not mourn for too long, but rather honor the fallen by living lives worthy of their sacrifice.” — Unknown
TODAY . . .
I’m a baby boomer, so that means I’m kinda’ old and have lived through a few things, one of them came when I was working at a large health facility in Atlanta. I was running a bit late and rushed out the door, turned on the car radio as I drove and waited to hear the traffic report. But I heard instead a reporting of a fire or explosion of some kind. The news was coming from a local station, but I, the woman with a plan, carried my radio that at that time could pick up TV stations. At the next stop light I tuned to GOOD MORNING AMERICA and heard that there had been a terrible accident, a plane had hit the World Trade Center. But as the story unfolded all of America began to hear that this might not be an accident. Surely you know by now that I speak of 9/11 when there was an attack, not an accident.
I made my way on to work, walked in and found everything as it had always been. I expected a flurry of activity, a beehive. Instead I walked into the calm, quiet world of gray cubicles just as I had always found them on a usual work day. I stopped to ask a co-worker if he had heard the news—he had not. But pretty soon, radios crackled and sent out the news, phones had rung and we were in it. We were to find out our nation had been attacked.
As it happens, my two closest co-workers were in Washington, D.C. for training. They were in the middle of a lecture when beepers began to go off like crickets on a late summer night in Georgia—that means loud. By this time the world pretty much knew what had happened. Of course nobody was actually working, but gathering to hear the latest news as we tried to absorb it. My mind flashed to another date when there had been a similar attack, and the infamy of December 7, 1941 came to my history buff mind. I had not been born then, but here I was deep in another historical, horrendous event for our nation.
The rest of the day is somewhat of a blur. We all returned to our desks, perhaps seeking some normalcy in a world turned upside down. We gathered at a conference room, occasionally catching the latest news on a television there. When someone told me the first tower had fallen I thought it was a horrid joke, spoken by someone who really needed help. But indeed the first tower had fallen, just like an implosion one sees when the destruction of a building takes place, so a new facility or project can occupy that space. That was it for me. I had tons of leave, so on my own recognizance I went to our timekeeper, checked out officially and came home to avoid a traffic snarl, and to watch even more television.
And today, yet again, I recall 9/11, how our nation came together, wars that have taken place since then, presidents and officials who have served. I quickly reran the years in my brain, like a sped up movie. It was overwhelming to think of what had transpired in my life, and my country’s life since that date in 2001.
I turned on the news and there standing side by side were the latest presidential hopefuls (who had just last night debated each other fiercely) shaking hands, and solemnly bowing their heads to honor all who were lost in that September debacle long ago.
I have to admit that I felt a tiny twinge of hope--hope that we can all once again come together as we did on September 12, 2001. I would like to see that. I would like to live out my last allotted years peacefully, free of disasters and angst, in a nation united. I know at this place and time that seems a tall order, I seem like an imbecile, yearning for the impossible. But I knew just what to do . . .
I bowed my head and quietly whispered, “Our Father, who art . . . “
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I have already sent the following out to some friends of mine, but in case you missed it CSPAN presented a talk by Garrett M. Graff as he discussed his book: The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11
I urge you to take an hour or so and go there and listen to it.
Secondly, a friend attended a small memorial service today at which there was a handout of the significance of the folds in the flag, as it is folded on special occasions and military funerals. I asked her to read it to me and I began to mist up as she did. I found this information online and think you might find it compelling, considering today’s date:
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