Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Remembering 9/11

Eleven years ago, I turned on the TV with a fresh cup of coffee in hand, patted the dog and flopped in my chair. I was off work that day and was making a list of groceries I needed to purchase and errands to run. It was a nice, nearly fall day. A day much like the one before it until the horrible news changed the world forever.

It was surreal. The image of a airplane flying into the tower over and over and over again. Sickening sights. Not to be believed. But it was true.

I called my husband at work to tell him but he, of course, already knew. The entire country knew and watched in real time as our country came to a standstill. He told me how he and his co-workers were glued to the TV. We spoke briefly, so much in shock, and with a catch in his voice and me in tears, we said "I love you" and hung up. What more was there to say?

Eleven years later we remember that fateful day with moments of silence, speeches and memorials. Our young president and his wife bowing their heads. Solemn. Prayerful. Sad.

We came together as a country after 9/11. It was required as a nation, uniting as one, resolved to make this tragedy somehow right again. Someday. Somehow. We showed the best of the USA. Resolute and united, strong under the worst of circumstances. We struggled and cried our way through, remembered the victims, holding loved ones in our hearts and then we rebuilt.... together as a nation.

Today, we are a divided country with our elections, conventions, TV ads and rhetoric. Sometimes it feels we will never pull together, work together and love one another again. We are still healing after the terror of that day eleven years ago in New York City but now politics has divided us. We need to respect one another and help one another regardless of our political leanings.

Can't we do that in memory of the victims of 9/11?

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