"But today if a day to remember. We remember the heroes of 9/11, both living and dead. We honor them. Many of us still remember our solemn promise - WE WILL NEVER FORGET! Unfortunately, some have forgotten. Some no longer honor our heroes. May the number of those people be forever small, and as time goes on, even smaller. Our 9/11 heroes deserve so much better."
As we go through life, there are certain milestone events which shape us. Sometimes change us. But whatever they are, many if not most of us, remember exactly what we were doing at the time of the event, where we were, and the aftermath. For example, I remember when John Kennedy was shot. Even though I was in Jr, High School, I remember it clearly. My folks for their entire lives, remember Pearl Harbor. Where they were, what they were doing. And most if not all, of the folks reading this blog article, remember 9/11 like it was yesterday. But it was not yesterday. It was twenty-five years ago today.
My story from twenty-five years ago is not that special. No different from many of us. I got up, got dressed and headed off to work in downtown Minneapolis. I was working at IBM, and IBM had American Express as a client. As I pulled in the parking lot across from the American Express building, I turned the car off and just looked out at the morning sky with wonder. This was going to be one of those "10 out of 10" days for weather. The sky was azure blue and nary a cloud was in sight. I was just turning the radio in the car off to head into work, when the first news flash came across. Some plane had hit the World Trade Center.
My first thought as I was walking into the building was if New York was having weather like we were having, how could some small plane not be paying attention and then fly into a building that size? When I got into my office, I turned on my radio. That is when the gravity of the situation hit me. It was not a small plane hitting a large building - it was a commercial air liner. Then my phone rang. It was my daughter calling from college. "Dad, what is going on? I am watching the news, and it showed an airliner hitting the WTC."
Then the second plane hit, and all of a sudden. I had a dozen people in my office glued to my radio. One of my co-workers who knew I was retired Navy asked me what I thought was going on. I was stunned and really had no idea what was happening. It did say this - "We might be at war, and this is an attack." Shortly thereafter, we were all sent home, as were most other businesses downtown.
Many people became heroes that day. Some of those heroes never made it home. Many of us when we arrived home that day, immediately turned on the TV. But a sense of foreboding was in the air. Was the attack over, or was something else, maybe even more sinister in the offing? Most of us were just numb - this was like a bad dream. A nightmare.
What did we learn from 9/11? The same thing we learned from Pearl Harbor. We need to be prepared. Expect the unexpected. Did anything good come out of 9/11? We learned that our homeland was a sitting duck. So, we promulgated the Department of Homeland Security. An organization which can keep us safer and more prepared.
But today is a day to remember. We remember the heroes of 9/11, both living and dead. We honor them. Many of us still remember our solemn promise - WE WILL NEVER FORGET! Unfortunately, some have forgotten. Some no longer honor our heroes. May the number of those people be forever small, and as time goes on, even smaller. Our 9/11 heroes deserve so much better.
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