September 11, 2001....Twelve years later

Folks,
   I had to rewrite what I planned to write today. I apologize for the delay. I watched some of the observances this morning and it made me change what I planned to write. Even after a few years of this, this gets no easier for me. This day probably gets no easier for most of us. I hope that I did a good job with my words and that I make my points well...or at least hope I inspire someone with more skill at this than me to do better. Just a thought. Lord willing, let's hope we are all here tomorrow, next month and next year at this time. God Bless America!

    I don’t have to rehash past years or where you were twelve years ago today. Anyone who was at least a teenager on September 11, 2001 should know…and should remember. It was sunny and warm (though not as warm as it is today, but nice). I do not have to go all of the pain we have endured and continue to endure since then. I don’t have to  go over all of the changes we have endured in this country since then, beginning at our airports and other mass transportation hubs and filtering down to even our NFL stadiums, our workplaces and even our homes and how we get our news and from whom.

    We can talk about the parallels between 9-11 and December 7, 1941. We have history reels, newspapers and tapes to refer to more now, for there are not many folk left who were alive that really can remember that day well. But if you can, you are someone we should be listening to while we still can. There was no Internet back then, TV was just getting going, no satellites, slower cross country transportation. Jet planes were still a few years away. Newspapers and radio still ruled the day.. The big difference is that at Pearl Harbor, almost all of the casualties were military folk and it was far from the mainland US, as was our involvement in the World War that followed.

   The attacks on September 11 occurred on our mainland, involved our capital and two of our largest and most important cities and most of the casualties were civilians, innocents and many of the first responders who went into the buildings and the fires and saved lives of strangers, even while knowing that their own lives may be (and for some, was) the price for doing their jobs and never wavering even in the face of death and destruction.

   Having been overseas these last few years I saw firsthand how our military at an overseas military chooses to honor this day. Each military observance on base is as somber as the observances are on the day that we honor those lost at Pearl Harbor. Or for Memorial Day or even for Veterans Day. For the military and for all of us, 9-11 is different. We lost innocent men, women and children that day and indirectly since then. We lost brave members of our military in the coming days, weeks and years indirectly from this, many far from home, some far closer to home.   

    The events of twelve years ago affect us all to this day and will for the foreseeable future. For virtually all of us, catching a flight at the airport is no longer as easy as a quick arrival at the airport, check in and go, plus it costs us more (another topic for another day). Now, security is more important than ever. Yes, it is less easy to go to a sporting event or the 4^th of July fireworks show at major locations, and you cannot take big purses and coolers anymore. September 11, 2001 reminds us that being the free nation that we are is not something to take for granted. Now, we in America know what most of the world has known with all of the civil wars and worse that occur far from our shores. The price of freedom is a steep one. We talk about getting involved in Syria and Iran and holding off the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and we fight to stop terrorism around the world, including at home. Those who hate us in foreign lands do not care that we argue among ourselves about gay rights, or race equality, or how the government goes crazy over trying to balance the federal budget or lower the national debt or unemployment. Terrorists do not care about the melting pot of races and culture this nation is.  Terrorists only see Americans and they see hate and little else.

   It is ironic that those who hate our way of life the most see our differences the least. What those terrorists did, from bin Laden down to the men who were the instruments on that fateful day is test our resolve. They hurt us all…bad. But they did not destroy us or our way of life, liked they hoped. We came together as one nation and we have been together ever since. Terrorists thought we would crumble when our homeland was hit. From our (former) President down to our youngest citizens, America has shown our strength and our resolve. Our people have shown even more in the last twelve years. America is far from perfect. We have a long way to go to fully achieve Dr. King’s Dream that was unveiled in Washington 50 years ago last month. But because we are strong in our diversity and our faith and our belief in each other, even when we don’t agree with each other all the time, we weather the storms our enemies throw at us and we come back stronger. And we do not fail.

   We did not fall. We survived, we endured and we never stopped. The terrorist leaders though we would never find them. It took time, but we found many of them, especially their leader and dispensed American justice but still with honor and respect, even for our foes. I will conclude with this simple statement. Never forget what it took to bring all Americans together, in sadness, in war, in death, in happiness and in victory. Never forget the price of freedom that so many pay for us, then, now, and forever. Instill in our future generations everything that we have learned and show them that this nation did not come this far to fall to cowards who don’t know who we are…and what we have become in less than three centuries. Keep our strength and our pride and our courage close, every day, every night and know that together, the light of freedom that is the United States of America will NEVER fail. No matter what anyone throws at us from anywhere at anytime. No matter what.