Remembering

Today is 9/11. Another day which will live in infamy.  Another of those days where we remember where we were, and what we were doing when the news broke about the attacks. 

I was at a training class for rural water board members.  I heard on the way that a plane had hit one of the towers, but details were sketchy.  Just as I got there, my father called and told me what was going on.  Several people in the meeting were board members from towns and cities.  They left because they might be needed at home.  They dismissed the entire class early. My wife was frantic because our oldest son had just left for his freshman year at Mississippi State.  There was concern that colleges might be targeted because of their research programs   I remember getting back to my office and watching with my parents the horror of it all.  

But the thing that touches me most about this day is the eyewitness account from a friend of mine who worked on Wall Street.  It’s too long to repost here but it is gut wrenching and heartbreaking at the same time.  His father was in the South Tower but miraculously was able to get out before it collapsed.  Sadly, the dust, dirt, and toxic waste caused the cancer that killed him a few years later.  

This is what I wrote on the first anniversary of that day.  

“That day, and the days, weeks and months to follow, we were truly "one nation, under God."  I have heard that America came together like that after Pearl Harbor, but in my lifetime I have never seen anything like the outpouring of patriotism and love for country that followed the 9/11 attacks.  For a short while, we weren't Democrat or Republican, rich or poor, black, white, Hispanic, or Asian.  We were Americans.  Period.  

That's the thing I'm most saddened by today.  We don't seem to feel that way any more.  In fact, most days it seems like we are the total polar opposite of how we felt after 9/11.  We are so focused on the issues that divide us, we have lost sight of the things that unite us. We have forgotten that working together, we overcame the vicious and brutal attack on our country.  There were no agendas, no political posturing, no power grabs.  We were Americans. Period. But these days we seem to have forgotten that. We live in the greatest country the world has ever known.  We know how to love one another, how to take care of one another, how to be our brother's keeper.  But it seems we have forgotten those things.  

On this anniversary of the worst terror attack on U.S. soil, I hope we can remember how we were, not on that day, but in the days that followed.  How we put aside our differences and focused on our strengths.   America needs to return to that way of thinking.  We still just need to be Americans.  Period”

We will always remember 9/11, but let’s also remember how we were on 9/12.