Archive for September, 2001
Infamy Revisited
27 September 2001You know what… The periods of mourning over the attacks may become less frequent with time, but they certainly don’t get any less intense.
Trying to put another tribute manip together (the third so far… maybe that’s not helping me get over it! lol), I came a cross one of those pictures of a fireman climbing the stairs of the World Trade Center. “What a capture of ultimate bravery,” I thought. Then I realized how ultimate it was. In all likelihood, he was among the rescue workers who were killed in the collapse. I’m looking at a dead man. I’m looking at a hero.
Captain America
16 September 2001Since flags are out of stock practically everywhere, I’ve decided another way to be patriotic. I’m gonna represent the red, white & blue comic-style, with a Captain America t-shirt. Since I can’t wear the shirt every day, I also put a flag patch (from my old scout uniform) on my backpack.
I dunno why, but I never hit that “anger” stage after all of this. Sure, I definitely want justice, I want them to pay, but I haven’t been consumed in anger by any means. Maybe I just haven’t had an opportunity, with all the positive attitude everyone’s giving. Or maybe it’s that the pitiful people that resorted to such an attack don’t even deserve such concern that anger would give. I guess that’s even more fundamental than protecting our freedom and things like that: not letting ourselves be consumed by hatred.
Not to say that I haven’t gotten mad at anyone. Aside from the terrorists, I’m really getting ticked by the people harassing Arab Americans and Muslims. They were hurt just like any other American. They lost loved ones too. The other people that are annoying me are celebrities of all people. Madonna’s the best example, trying to give Bush advice to restrain himself or something. Like the nation’s experts on dealing with this situation need advice from a woman who pretty much made a fortune selling sex. Not that I don’t think he should show restraint. He IS showing restraint. Many countries of the world are more than anxious to blow some terrorists up, and a lot of us here are too, but Bush is making sure it’ll be done right and in as cleanly a manner as possible. Anyone watching the news beyond the seven-second sound-bytes should see that, especially some of his discussion at Camp David.
INFAMY
12 September 2001I always wondered what stories I’d have to tell my grand kids one day… This is one I don’t want to be able to tell. You all know what happened, so I won’t go into those horrifying details. This is going to be a recap of how it happened to me.
9:30 AM - After ignoring the phone a few times, I finally answer. My mom was at work and busy, but she said something about “world trade center leveled” and “planes flying into buildings”… I thought I’d woken up to World War III… Hopefully, that’s not what it becomes… To boot, I’d just read “The Dark Knight Returns”, a graphic novel in the Batman continuum, last week. In it were images of… planes crashing into buildings… the city on fire… and what was bad, was that the story was nearly apocalyptic. So the day didn’t start out good at all.
As it went on, it didn’t get any better… The casualty count at the Pentagon, which they were hopefully saying “was under renovation” and “very strong” kept climbing closer and closer to that upper ball-park number of 800… and the WTC… I guess one doesn’t realize how many people can fit in a building like that… But it could easily dwarf the numbers lost at Pearl Harbor. But now I’m writing about what I said I wouldn’t.
Anyhow… That “numb” feeling that they said would fade after the first day was almost completely out of my system by half past noon. In its place, came sorrow. No, I didn’t know a single person in those buildings or plains. But I love America so much… I guess when nothing’s wrong and we’re tied up in cynicism, it’s easy to forget how wonderful this country is. When this happened, I remembered it in full.
I prayed. I don’t pray often… I always felt that God would want me to “keep on truckin’,” to save prayer for things that were out of my hands… It feels bad to say hi to God for the first time in a long time under such horrible conditions…
I cried… I didn’t ball into a pillow all day, though maybe it would’ve been good to… But as I watched and listened, I couldn’t keep the tears back… It was just so horrendous. Tears come to my eyes as I write this.
Perhaps it’s too optimistic of an approach, but somewhere throughout the day I started picking up this profound sense of hope, maybe even joy… Certainly not because of what happened, but because of how the world reacted. Guliani was amazing despite being practically underneath the falling towers… Bush, despite a bit of tardiness due to the national security problems, handled it well, probably better than his dad would’ve. Democrats and Republicans were seeing singing for hope on the steps of Capitol Hill… Clinton even expressed his full backing and agreement to Bush’s positions on the matter… For the first time I remember, we acted like a country… not just fifty states, but fifty states united.
What probably got me even more was the response from other countries. England, France, Germany, Russia… Even Israel, Iran, and Pakistan… all expressed great condolences and support for America. Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon was the speech of the day… Saying that this was “a turning point on the war against terrorism”, and a war between good and evil, between the humanity of the world and the darkness of terrorism… I hope I can get a video of it, because it was so touching…
Much of the rest of the day was spent talking to people about what I’m writing now… consoling to those who are more shaken up, debating to those others who were trying to make sense… I went to every site I could think of to try to get some messages of support on the front pages… I sent a chain IM to the same effect… I guess I’ve been trying to maximize that feeling of unity, of community. On comics2film.com, I had to console some who’d seen the planes crashing into the World Trade Center… Some who had cousins and grandfathers and friends in the area… Now that I think about it, I’m so lucky not to have felt such direct loss… But at the time all I cared was to support them.
It’s getting a lot of allusions to Pearl Harbor. I guess it makes sense, since these incidents are the only two attacks on American soil since the Civil War. In my opinion, it’s worse… These weren’t soldiers and sailors, these people are citizens… Teachers, writers, football coaches… The same type of people who live next door to us, the same type of people that we all know. And it looks like it may even be worse in the number count. Hence the subject of this entry, as I take a cue from one of the major papers… Just as that day sixty years ago, September 11, 2001, is a date that will live in infamy. I end by saying just one thing: Those who planned this “second Pearl Harbor”, forgot a place called “Hiroshima”.