9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

[BadgerAlum@WMU]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

I was at Western, a doctoral student, teaching American history for the first time. I had a schedule that allowed me to sleep 9-10 hours a night and have plenty of day for research/teaching prep. My husband was up, but I was not, and he didn't have the TV on. I got up just about 9am, and went out to the living room, and was looking over his shoulder at the computer when I saw a blurb about a plane hitting the WTC. I figured it was some wayward Cessna or something small like that, but we ended up turning on the television, figuring the morning news shows based in NY would be covering it. We got the Today show on just after the second plane hit and just as Jim Miklaszewski reported he felt the Pentagon shake and heard what sounded like a blast.

I spent the day watching the news, since every channel on our cable had it on, except TV Asia, which was near Ground Zero and went off the air. I watched coverage in French, German, Russian, Spanish, and English. I called my mother. A friend in Chicago's husband was in the air when it happened, going west. His plane landed in Omaha and he and three others rented a car to drive back to Chicago. She could not get through to his parents in Florida to tell them he was OK, so I made the call for her. Class was canceled. I think we ended up going out to get food because we wanted to get away from the coverage for a little while.

We were supposed to play Michigan at the Big House that weekend, but everything got canceled and moved a week. I will never forget the moment of silence before the game; it was the definition of a deafening silence, when you have 111,000+ people not making a sound in a bowl that, I believe, is partially in the ground, especially when it had been made a no-fly zone. Then the halftime show, which added God Bless America played by both The Sound of Western and the Michigan marching band, made me cry.

The incident made me think more seriously about my life, I will be honest, and what I was doing with it and how I was looking at others in the process. I now embrace love more, try to reach out more, and realize that certain things just aren't important in the grand scheme of life. I also became more aware of myself, more accepting of my true talents and gifts, and realized that what I was doing was just not right for who I was.

[Jimjamesak]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

Well to be honest, I slept through the important events. Time zones are weird like that. I was a junior in high school and school started at 7:30am, so I usually didn't wake up until 6:30am. In Alaska the first plane hit at 4:46am, second at 5:03am, the north tower collapsed at 6:28am. Most of us here woke up to the news, never saw anything as it happened like most of you. I woke up at 6:30 like usual and after a shower and such turned on SportsCenter like usual and saw the blurb about the attacks in the corner of the screen and thought "My God, did we get nuked?" I changed the channel and saw we didn't get nuked but it wasn't much better. That day of school was just a waste, whole day spent watching TV, the teachers couldn't think of anything else to do.

My one vivid memory of that day is when I went out for lunch. I was walking in the parking lot of a local supermarket and I looked up. Now, for those who've never been to Anchorage, in Anchorage at any point in a day you can look up and see some kind of plane, a tiny Cessna, a 737, an F-15 (or nowadays an F-22), a C-5, a 747 cargo plane, whatever. I looked up that day and only saw two F-15's flying in close formation with tiny objects hanging off of their wings.

[IrishHockeyFan]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

While the events unfolded I thought of everything that had led to that point, and wondered about how different the world would be from that day forward.

Then my daughter called me from school (she was not quite 15) and simply wanted to touch base with both me and her mother, just to feel something in the way of normalcy for just a second I suppose.

When she got home later on that afternoon, the first thing she wondered was "are we really at war now dad?" Then the inevitable "what if they make you go?" She was much younger the last time we had been separated by any military commitment of mine, and while she recognized and remembered her dad was away and her world was different, she really had no clear understanding then of just why. Now she would have and at that second most of my thoughts turned very selfish and I was quite thankful I was long passed any active service and no one was going to make me go anywhere this time.

We watched with horror the rest of that day and much of the next few as the scope of the tragedy became apparent, and just how horrific and evil the people who planned and carried out these attacks were. I tried to assure my daughter that these people, while claiming to act with the blessing of their God, were in reality bastardizing the Islamic faith, hiding behind their horribly wrong interpretation of the beliefs of a billion people, most of them only concerned with the same things we were, how to raise a family, put food on the table, enjoy their lives with friends and family. Just like how anyone claiming to act in the name of a Christian God while burning a cross on the lawn of a black family is full of sh!7, so too were these people who thought they were acting in the name of God, when all they were really doing was acting in the name of evil.

Shortly thereafter, I began to notice a change in my daughter. Where for quite some time I was the (often) frustrated parent of a (in my eyes) selfish teenage girl, she was beginning to shed those characteristics and began to look for ways to make things better around her. It started small. She did homework with little prompting. She stopped being sooooo materialistic. She took a liking to volunteering at one of the local public libraries (from time to time I doubted she knew what a book was). She even worked on a Habitat For Humanity house with the church group of a friend of hers.

When she was 17, she told her mother and I she wanted to join the military. We were a little surprised. And more than a little scared. Neither of us had come from families that were particularly steeped in military tradition. Many who served did so at a time when the draft was still a reality, and amongst her immediate relatives, I was the only one with any sort of a long time commitment, and she was only 7 when my active time was over. Of course one of her first arguments was “If it was OK for you, why isn’t it just as OK for me?” Now here I am, being selfish again. Most kids who pull that line out on mom or dad do so after getting caught smoking, or drinking, or wrecking the family car, or getting pregnant when they are 16. But I joined the Marines because I didn’t like going to college, I told her. And because I thought I was a lot tougher than I probably was. And by the time I had my first stripe sewn on my sleeves, they weren’t sending us 1000s of miles away to be shot at (that would come later). She was considering this at a time when people who joined the military were being sent to places where they were shooting at you.

She told us she wanted to serve. “Look at those first responders at the World Trade Center,” she said. “They knew -- they HAD to know -- that the chances of them saving a lot of people had to be next to zero. How could anyone have survived in those planes? In those offices? Yet 100s and 100s of firefighters and police officers and paramedics rushed up those stairs, and into that smoke, and into all that sadness, because maybe they could help someone.” She spoke so plainly. So definitively. "Maybe I can help someone."

9-11 made my daughter want to help someone. Her mom and I tried to tell her she could serve her community, her country, the world, here at home, if that’s what she chose to do. There are people in your neighborhood and in mine doing it everyday. It could be that firefighter. It could be that nurse. It could be that teacher in the worst inner-city school you know of who got through to that kid last week that education may be all you really need to give yourself a chance.

She understood all that, but wanted us to understand that she felt that everyone must give in their own way. This was to be her way. 9-11 made my daughter want to help, but it made me selfish. I didn’t want to share her, didn’t want her half a world away, didn’t want to spend weeks and months worrying every day about her well being, knowing I had no control whatsoever over whether or not harm would come her way.

Now sometimes I get angry when I see a picture of my daughter in uniform. Angry at how people can spread so much evil throughout the world, undoing all the good that so many try to do. Angry that after all these 100s of thousands of years, we still have not learned how to truly live in peace amongst ourselves. But there’s my little girl out there. And so many more sons and daughters just like her. Trying. 9-11 made my daughter want to help.

To all those out there, whether they be down the block, or an ocean away wearing the uniform of the United States of America, who are serving with selflessness, decency, and compassion, God bless you. May the memory of all those who suffered on September 11, 2001 make us all want to help. And then, perhaps out of that horror, the world may finally know something like peace.

God bless the United States Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, and of course, Air Force, and all those who serve. Come home to us soon.

[XYZ]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

As I don't think it's been mentioned here yet, the USCHO Hall of Shame does indeed have at least one worthy entry.

Chilling.

[SteveP]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

Irish that's the most powerful post I've read in all my time at this forum. Thank you for raising a true hero.

[bigmrg74]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

Copilot of 9/11 jet is honored with a statue in West Chester

A legend from the fall (video)

Seeing that flyover with 3 C-130 had to be something else.

[Netman]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

Irish, You have raised one fine young lady. As a parent, I understand your feelings. As an American, I am proud! Thank her for me please.

[du78]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

For those of you who live outside the NY City and Washington, D.C areas, our lives have been changed more than many of you may know. We ride the subways and trains not knowing if the unknown person on the train with a backpack is the next terrorist. We go through security just to enter the office buildings we work in. Random anti-terrorist squads show up unannounced all over NYC at potential targets including well known buildings, train stations, subways, etc. They are dressed in full military gear with machine guns as their choice of weapons. This has become the norm rather than the abnormal. The firehouse next to my office lost 10 men on 9/11. There is a memorial to those 10 just inside the entrance to the station. The firemen leave the overhead doors open so the tourists can go in, see the memorial and take pictures. We are reminded every day what happened 9 years ago. Over 35 former students, parents of students and relatives of students died on 9/11 that were associated with my high school. My nephew lost his best friend on 9/11.

Today we had a special mass for those in our suburban Long Island community who lost their lives on 9/11. There were eight who died on 9/11 and two first responders who have succumbed to diseases they contracted during the search and rescue. One of our parish priests is a chaplain for the NYC Fire and Police Departments and was a first responder on 9/11. He organized the mass and ceremony which was a very emotional one for all. You could see in the faces of my neighbors who were first responders on 9/11, the sadness they still feel. Below is summary of what took place during the mass and ceremony from the church bulletin.

9/11 MEMORIAL DEDICATION CEREMONY

On Sunday, September 12, 2010, we will have a special Mass at Noon and Memorial Dedication in honor of the victims of the World Trade Center tragedy.

First, we will dedicate a bronze plaque on which will be mounted on two pieces of steel cut from the ruins of the Twin Towers. The plaque, mounted in the gathering space and suitably inscribed, will honor the police officers, firefighters, rescue personnel, as well as members of the Sacred Heart Parish family who also perished on 9/11/01.

Secondly, we will dedicate the 9/11 Stained Glass Rose Window over the main entrance, which contains the various symbols commemorating that day.

Third, we will bless two new marble statues: St. Michael – Patron of Police Officers, and St. Florian - Patron of Firefighters.

We are planning to have the Ceremonial Unit Color Guards from the New York City Police Department, the Port Authority Police Department, the Fire Department of New York City, and the Nassau County Police Department, present and participating in the ceremonies.

We are encouraging ALL members of the parish who are police officers, firefighters, and rescue personnel (active & retired) to attend IN UNIFORM,
since this celebration will also be to honor those who are still serving in these professions.

We invite and encourage any families in the parish who have lost loved ones at 9/11/01 to also to attend. The names of these civilians will be read at the Mass.

[LynahFan]

Re: 9/11 - Never forgetting the tradgedy that day

On a lighter note (sorry if I've shared this story before - one of my faves):

I have a cousin who lives out in the country in VA. Her husband is pretty handy, and got to know their neighbor by helping him out with chores around his farm. Turns out the neighbor actually made some pretty good $$$ during the early days of the dot-com craze and retired to the country to enjoy life - a very down-to-earth guy. How down to earth? Well, on 9-11, he was stuck in Chicago, flight canceled (of course), couldn't get a train, bus, rental car, rickshaw - everything fully booked. He called his wife and said, "Sorry, I just can't get out of Chicago - looks like I'm going to be stuck here for a few days."

She replied, "Honey, you have more than $100M in the bank. Go buy yourself a car and drive home!"

He said, "Oh, I could do that, couldn't I?" So he bought a nice Subaru Outback (that he was thinking about getting anyway for doing work on the farm) and drove home.