9/11 - Five Years On

I drove to work listening to music and entered the building thinking about the football game the night before. When I saw the crowd in the conference room, I knew something bad had happened. I hadn't seen a crowd like that at work since the Challenger blew up.

I saw the planes hit and the towers fall at my desk, courtesy of our T1 line and streaming video. I remember speaking with a coworker in the hall who wailed, "What will the markets do?". I paused, stunned at his words, and responded, "That's not important now." It's funny, I can remember exactly where we stood, but can't remember who I was speaking with.

My wife and I reached out to family and friends in NYC and Washington. We were lucky. A friend who worked in WTC 1 was on vacation, and my cousin, who was at a meeting in the Pentagon, escaped harm.

In the days that followed, I heard more about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda than I had ever heard before, saw pictures of Afghanistan on TV instead of in National Geographic, and watched President Bush gain stature as he reassured the country we would heal and defeat those who had attacked us.

The year that followed was a down year. There was a lot of patriotic fervor and display, which in the past had always boosted my morale, but somehow felt false this time. I felt an undercurrent of intolerance and jingoism, a willingness to strike out at dissenters, and it chilled me even though I was no dissenter, but heartily in favor of striking back against Al Qaeda. It smacked of McCarthyism.

That spring, Colorado caught fire; at least that's what the governor said. He got slammed for hyperbole, but I knew what he meant. Smoke was everywhere, friends and coworkers fled their homes, and a hacking, asthmatic cough was my constant companion.

That summer brought a drought, everybody's lawn died, and the area farmers were in misery.

So when September 11, 2002 rolled around, I studiously avoided the media blitz of coverage and remembrance. It was still too soon, too fresh a pain.

The war drums were beating for Iraq, and I felt that was a mistake. Most of my friends were surprised to hear this from me, but they seemed to respect my argument that we hadn't finished job one, Al Qaeda, and were spreading our forces too thin.

However, only my town gassed anti-war protestors, a low point for our community.

I was all too soon proven right, but I got past that, for time and family and work have a healing effect.

On September 11, 2003, I sat alone at my computer after the kids went to bed and watched the videos of the WTC. I felt the familiar sadness and a cold resentment toward our leaders who had abandoned their duty to defeat bin Laden and bring him to justice.

I don't look at 9/11 pictures now. It's not that I avoid them, but I've put them in context.

I changed after 9/11, as many Americans did. I walk into work thinking about the lecture or debate I listened to in the car, or the court opinion I read the night before. Where I used to open the morning paper to the sports section and comics, now I read the news and editorials first. I used to read science fiction and mysteries, now I read non-fiction, history, politics, economics, and law. Of course, there are more mysteries now.

I keep a well thumbed copy of the Constitution in my pocket, write my Congressmen periodically, and occasionally the editor of the newspaper. I tune out celebrity gossip, but can still talk football even though I only watch a game or two a year.

I cherish my family and my friends more than before, because I know that there will be another attack. And while I pray that we make it though OK, I will not live in fear of it.

Our enemy profits from such fear, for it diminishes our Republic.

Until next year, keep the faith.

God Bless America, and keep her free!