September 11, 2001 is one of those days that is common in the memories of people who experienced the horror. Those of us old enough to remember when Kennedy was assassinated, when John Lennon was murdered, 9/11, shared memories of the nation and the world. Frozen seconds that will always be sharp in our collective memory.
I was here at home. My husband's company was making a huge announcement that day. The kind of announcement that makes the national news. He was in California to handle the west coast announcement and then immediately board a plane for Hawaii. This was corporate hush, hush big voodoo. We, even spouses, were all under orders to NOT say anything to anyone. Cone of silence sort of behavior. There was no chance he would make it to Hawaii before the Corporate grapevine and the news reached employees there so he was not looking forward to potential mob rule when he got to his Honolulu office. Not to mention a flight to Hawaii is almost as much fun as a long root canal while you need to pee.
Sitting here watching The Today Show with Katie, Bryant and Matt I was waiting for the news portion at the half hour to hear about the GE/Xerox partnership and watch the stocks as the news hit wall street. Suddenly Matt was talking about a plane hitting the World Trade Center and was talking to a woman by phone who lived near the site. She advised him it was just a small plane but there was so much smoke. I knew immediately that a small plane would have bounced off the WTC, if there was a lot of smoke, that's jet fuel. They finally got the helicopter shot and then BOOM, the second jet hit the second tower.
I started trying to call my husband. He was in the closed door, no cell phones on, top secret meeting. The towers were both billowing black smoke and helicopters were capturing pictures of the trapped people. NBC switched to their correspondent at the Pentagon. This was obviously a planned a vicious attack. Jim "Mick" Miklashevski was communicating with the studio via phone. He was explaining all the activity in the Pentagon when he said, "I don't want to cause panic but I just heard a loud explosion here and there is..." lost connection.
"WAR", was all I could think. Oh God, we are at war. The days of living as a free society for our generation, over. Time for us to step up and get ready to defend our homeland. I was ready, get a gun and start looking for the perpetrators and kill those bastards. Those poor people in New York! How will they survive? How will the even get out of the city? Then I started worrying about people around the nation with family in the city having no idea how their loved ones are. Then I went, SHIT, my brother works THERE in Manhattan. Holy Crap, (he lives in Connecticut but worked in the financial district). I had no idea if he was close to the WTC. Financial District sounds, you know, close to where the WTC would be.
I kept calling the husband and now the parents. I wanted to know if they were aware of the fact that we were at war and if they had brother's phone number at work. They knew nothing, they were reading the paper. I told them to turn on the television, go to the store and get anything they might need for several days and try to reach brother at work. I called my sister-in-law. She was getting ready to ride at the barn. Is brother OK, do you know? What about the kids? I asked thinking everyone in the world must know by now. She didn't know a thing. Call him, I said. Call me back the WTC and The Pentagon have been hit with planes, we are at war.
Finally reached my husband after the meeting. I told him, don't go to the airport, no point. DO NOT return your rental car, you may never get home. You will have to drive here. Start now. WHAT? he said, I heard something about a bomb in New York. NO PLANES......they are flying planes into buildings. Get on the road NOW. Who is flying planes..what? CRAZY NUT JOBS, get in your car....start driving.
And then.....the horror, the awful unbelievable hatred of people to destroy innocents. The gall to come here, TO LIVE HERE and then destroy lives and the confidence of a nation. NOT FOR LONG. America doesn't take kindly to war. We suspend habeas corpus, we round people up who look like the enemy. Now I get the entire, terrible, disgusting, internment of Japanese Americans in WWII. I understand the paranoia. How disgusting and necessary to make the vast majority of people feel safer. War is not fair. War is mean. War has different rules. Yeah, America is going to look different for a while and then we will return to our beloved freedom.
I waited for the news that all borders and ports would be closed. We would be trapped in the nation for a while and people would be stopped from entering. It would take a while but we would find out who is here and why and where they came from and remove or imprison those we found suspicious. Sucks for them. We would have to conserve everything. We would all have to work together as a nation for a while. Victory gardens and rationing. That's war. The citizens sacrifice too. These tough times make a nation strong. They remind people about our responsibility to preserve what others before us died to create and maintain.
American interests overseas would be seriously considered. Commerce would halt for a bit. World War. You don't attack America and expect us to be generous anywhere. We help allies and starve the enemy. Oh yeah, this is like a real war, not a conflict. Here we go.....
No, we didn't. We had some rallies and talked about how we were gonna get the bad guys and send them somewhere to be tortued. Can't stop commerce! Hell no. Politically incorrect to round up those who look like the enemy. WHAT? WAR people....this is war. We have been attacked Pearl Harbor style. LET'S STOP THIS NOW!
No, we will look for Bin Laden. We have playing cards with pictures and names of bad guys. WHAT? We will make all of America pay. We will strip search people at the airport. We will put cameras everywhere so we will know what happened after the fact. Citizens will be searched and screened at public venues. EXCUSE ME? This is America, remember? We kick the enemies ass when they attack us. HELLO? So we are all guilty until proven innocent to see a concert? The symphony? The State Fair? No, not in my America. We get tough on those unfortunate enough to look like the people who killed us. Totally unfair, but hey, war is simply different.
Then we started a war in a country with imaginary WMDs and had nothing to do with 9/11 at all. WHAT?Have we lost all sense of reason? Is this some dream or nightmare where we do something incredibly stupid again? The theory was that all the bad guys who want to kill us would go to Iraq to engage us. No, of course they won't. They want to kill us HERE and abroad where we have interests and/or other infidels live. I didn't go to West Point and I know this is the most ignorant strategy on earth. Patton must have been slapping everyone he could get his hands on. NO, off to war we went under the quise of a pre-emptive defensive strike. Shock and awe. I had it. WHAT? What is the objective? We are creating war to what end? No end of course....we went in like the yahoo cowboy in the white house, not a freaking clue.
We are marking the 10th anniversary in a few days. We aren't celebrating a victory, we are pouring over the sadness. We are all still guilty until proven innocent in our own country because we seek entertainment or entrance into a government building. What are our leaders doing? Trying to figure out how to continue to be in power. It's all they ever care about. We can't celebrate the end of anything because we can't stop it now. Big Brother is here and we might as well get used to it. Your phone can be tapped, your house can be invaded for cause. You can be felt up at the airport because you flinched or sneezed or look nervous. Gramma ain't gonna blow up that plane.
Me, I would rather die in service to freedom. Let me get on a plane and take my chances. Put an air marshall on board every plane, search all the freakin' luggage, allow us no carry ons, whatever, don't treat me like I am getting ready to have my Miranda rights read to me so I can go on vacation. I would rather enter a building for a fun evening without opening my purse and being wanded to make sure I don't beep. The other Eagles or McCartney fans aren't going to blow me up. If I'm wrong, oh well. Shit happens.
Soon, since crazy and the second amendment go hand in hand in some instances, we won't be able to enter restaurants and stores without being wanded. Ask the people at Luby's or IHOP or many work places and even an Amish school. Crazy is everywhere. If someone really wants to make a statement and kill others, and then themselves of course because chicken and crazy go together too, no amount of screening and searching and recording is going to stop that.
I want my country back. I want to ensure that we aren't letting people live here to get an education or job or opportunity because they want to and can afford it. Sorry, if you are from a nation that harbors or produces or breeds terrorism your chances of getting in America are limited. If you don't like it, change your country. Change your religion. Speak out against the crazies in Islam, don't stand back and be silent. It is a religion full of love and peace and understanding. What the fringe does should make you cringe. Much like the "Christian" believers who make themselves the center of their own religion. We kill them. Enter their compounds, take their "children" and incarcerate the always old geezer who needs virgin brides.
We should be celebrating victory over the insanity of those who hate us. We are instead still at the memorial service. Time for the wake.
LBB
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