The couch. I was asleep on the couch. It was a Tuesday morning, and my roommate had just gotten home from his night shift job. I was asleep because my second-shift job ran a little later than usual the night before. He came in the door and told me to turn on the TV, that something crazy was going on. I turned on CNN just in time to see the plane hit the second tower. As I watched, I remember thinking how surreal it was, like a movie scene. I was 2 weeks shy of my 21st birthday. It could be said that I didn’t have a firm grasp on how the world really worked. As I sat and watched the towers fall to the ground, I knew the world would be a different place. I just wasn’t sure how different.
Something else I remember vividly about that day. When I went to work that evening, I had to make a stop at the Kroger in Corbin, KY. The store has gas pumps out front, and I’ve never to this day witnessed such a crazy scene as the lines at the pumps that evening. Cars were everywhere. Inside, news coverage had preempted the Muzak usually heard in stores. As I passed by a woman, she said to me, "I’m so sick of hearing about this already. I wish they’d just hush and go on." Now, I wasn’t sure to what extent things would be different, but I knew enough to realize this wasn’t something that allows people to "hush and go on".
In a way, it still hasn’t completely sunk in. I was a young, clueless guy, fresh off flunking out of college for not applying myself. I didn’t have any purpose or direction at the time. So, there wasn’t ever really a sense of "wow, this is so different than before." I guess, more than anything, I’m still in awe over the fact this country could suffer such a fate.
So what has changed? Pretty much everything. The Freedom Act. Tighter airport security. Backlash against Muslims living in America. Even Toby Keith changed, as pretty much every song he has written since has been about how strong the country is. It was an upsurge of patriotism I had never seen, at least not since the first Gulf War, and that wasn’t patriotism so much as it was rooting against the enemy.
It could be argued that I’m somewhat jaded against this country, for whatever reasons I have. I love living here, it has more to offer than any other place on earth. But I also know that there are many flaws in America’s design. I’m also jaded against the rest of society, because collectively, we are a group of idiots who can’t be trusted to govern ourselves, so we have to be governed by another group of idiots, except those idiots have more money and less morals. For the most part, it’s a losing situation to the average citizen. But, after the attacks, I had never felt such pride in my fellow Americans, and for my country. It was a show of unity I had never seen, and probably never will again. It proved beyond a doubt that this is the strongest country on earth. It was one of the few times I didn’t find myself questioning someone’s motives. And it was glorious.
Today is a day for reflection and remembrance. Remember Flight 11. And Flight 175. And Flight 77. And Flight 93. And the many who lost their lives. Remember the bravery and valor of the NYPD and FDNY. Be thankful today for your freedom, for your family, and for the men and women in our Armed Forces giving their lives to keep such freedoms possible. Hug your children. And be thankful you live in a country where a terrorist attack that took nearly 3,000 lives, shut us down for a few days, and destroyed a national landmark didn’t make us weak. [I]It made us stronger.[/I]
God Bless the U.S.A.
