9/11...a decade ago

In many ways, it seems like a whole lifetime ago. I remember, I was in fourth grade, off-track. I woke up, and it was a beatutiful day. The sun was shining through my window. It wasn't until I went down stairs, where my parents were watching the t.v. There, I watched live footage of planes smashing into towers. and then, the towers collapsed in a plume of ash and dust. And then to hear the news that a plane had just crashed into the pentagon...my 9 year old mind didn't understand. What I saw did not register as real. This must be for a movie of some kind. Planes don't crash into buildings...I didn't know about terrorists or terrorism until then. But it was a world away from me.
I remember in the days and weeks that followed, all they could show was these plans crashing into buildins, over and over again, as if by doing so, they could mabye stop it. And I was tired of seeing this. "Everyone's seen this already. Stop showing it and lets move on to other news." But there was no other news...
Yet. I will never forget how America rallied together that day. Like December 7, a day similiar to 9/11, it was meant to crush our spirit, to show our enemies that we were the weaker nation.


both parties were wrong.


Our ancestors gave up their lives fighting for this country, and we were about to prove why we have won. Americans were united in purpose, prayer and duty. We wanted to find those responsible and amke them pay.


10 years later...I don't see the unitiy that once was there. It's replaced by the same callous attitude we had before. We blame the government, blah blah blah, and we aren't as united anymore. But we should be united, more than ever. We are the UNITED States of American after all.


I remember my senior year in high school, when the anniversary rolled around, I felt like I was the only one being patriotic. I was wearing red, white and blue because I wanted, in my small way, to show my respect for the men and women who gave their lives that day. It felt like everyone else was treating it as just another day.

The people I feel bad for now are the people, like my nieces and nephews who have to grow up learning about what happened at such a young age. I wonder if they'll believe us when we tell them what happened. Where we were on that day. Will they look at us like we're crazy? When they see the footage of the Twin Towers going down, will they scoff, and say that was done digitally?


But they need to know. They need to know that the country they still live in is now, and forever, the land of the free, and the home of the brave.