It’s hard to imagine that it has been a decade since that fateful day, but here we are … ten years gone, and no closer to healing.
We’re waiting for the Freedom Tower to be completed, but will even that be able to fill the hole left in our hearts on that Tuesday morning? No, it won’t.
While the new tower will be a defiant move, nothing can ever replace all of the people we lost that day, the sense of innocence and being untouchable. We didn’t just lose lives and buildings that day, the United States was irrevocably changed and no endless streams of speeches and new towers will replace that.
A lot of things ended on September 11th, 2001, and one of them was our sense of security or our place in the world. We no longer had the illusion of being safe and untouchable here; the enemies of this country can get you anywhere and anytime they want.
While I don’t condone in living in fear, or letting our government just take more and more of our freedoms, but I do fully stand behind the idea that you need to always be vigilant and observant, but then I was that way long before that day.
Today, more than any day, just hug your loved ones and think back to the days when those two towers still stood.
With the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks looming large this weekend, news broke tonight that an unconfirmed, but credible threat has been discovered aimed towards New York City and Washington D.C.
While details have been sparse thus far, the rumors are that the plot uncovered by law enforcement say that three people are involved in the plan, and one of them is a U.S. citizen. While there have been many other uncovered plots, some of which fail to have any credibility in the end, with such an important anniversary looming large, it is definitely hard to ignore.
Hopefully this will be another case of there being nothing to the story, but to everyone, everywhere, while paying attention is always important, a few extra thoughts of anything you see suspicious at this time would not be a bad idea.
Every year I debate if I still need to do this post, but then I realize that somehow talking about some stupid movie or television show, ranting about a law that irritates me and so on just wouldn’t make a lot of sense, nor would it feel right.
Last year I talked about how you shouldn’t wait for another disaster to say “thank you” to emergency workers, and I hope you have taken that time. This year I’m not going to preach to you about anything, but I just hope you take a moment out of the normal everyday things that distract us to think about what happened on that fateful Tuesday morning.
Think about those that we lost in the buildings and on those flights.
Think about the brave passengers of Flight 93 that fought back.
Think about how that morning changed the lives of every American in some way.
While I didn’t lose anyone that morning, it set so many things in motion for me. It closed many chapters of my life, and, unbeknownst at the time, set a series of events in motion that would in a round about a way open up another chapter.
Just take a moment, and think about the world prior to 9/11, and what it’s like today. At least in my lifetime there has been no other event that so clearly defined a change in the entire world. It’s odd to know that you actually lived history. You always think of history as something that happens to someone else, but every citizen of the United States became part of a moment in history that morning, and it’s up to us that no one ever forgets what exactly happened that day, or those that came after.
When was the last time you thought about a fireman? A policeman? An EMT? Why not take a moment today to do that?
Eight years ago today terror came to our doorstep, and a certain breed of men and women raced toward it to help their fellow man. In the weeks and months following 9/11, people embraced emergency workers all across the country, even if they weren’t near Ground Zero, they were all brothers and sisters, and people remembered these people that work tirelessly in the backgrounds of our lives.
As time passed, as with so many things, people stopped thinking about them again, and I think it’s time we did again.
Each year on this date I write a post marking the memory of September 11th, but I think maybe it’s time we once again celebrate these people who work constantly to save our lives and protect us. I admit my bias in that my paternal grandfather was a fire captain in Phoenix, AZ in my childhood, but that is my extent of connection to emergency workers.
So why not take a moment of your time and donate to a local emergency worker charity? Do you drive by a fire department each day? Why not take them some ice cream or treats? (trust me, fireman will never turn down food) Tell a policeman you appreciate them. Why should we wait for the next disaster to remember these relatively unsung heroes of our world?
September 11th will never be a “happy” day again in the history of this country, but it doesn’t mean we can’t do something good with it for those around us.
I debated all day if I wanted to say anything this year or just continue with my normal BS posts, but you obviously can tell what won out.
As I said last year, 9/11 has come to mean many things to me, it changed my life in a number of ways; it probably led to me finally sealing the idea I would close my retail store to concentrate on other venues, but it also brought about other changes I am more reluctant to discuss.
For whatever reason, it seems to bother me more with each passing year instead of getting a numb feeling. Perhaps I should be grateful for the fact that I’m not turning into some sort of machine where something of this magnitude doesn’t effect me, but it also makes me not thrill to this day each year when it rolls around.
I try to concentrate on the things I’m thankful for, the people in my life, and that it hasn’t happened again.
So, I talked about how Packet 8 messed us over when we tried switching to them for VoIP. Well, we’re looking around now, not giving up on the idea quite yet, but we have hit a new snag… 911 service.
It seems, according to Verizon Voicewing, that no one is able to give us 911 service, so they don’t want us as a customer due to liability issues. That’s all wonderful, however, while we fall in the Kirksville 911 calling area… our house is outside of the area they’ll come out to! Even though we can call 911, they just go “Sorry, we can’t come out there.”
I am going to keep trying to find a VoIP provider who doesn’t care, but we’re kinda screwed for the moment and it’s getting annoying!
It’s hard to imagine that it has been a decade since that fateful day, but here we are … ten years gone, and no closer to healing.
With the tenth anniversary of the 
When was the last time you thought about a fireman? A policeman? An EMT? Why not take a moment today to do that?
I debated all day if I wanted to say anything this year or just continue with my normal BS posts, but you obviously can tell what won out.
