REMEMBER 9/11

...as we Americans continue to protect our own brand of freedom.

We’re patriotic and proud of our awesome troops. This is a tribute I posted this past Memorial Day. And I wish to honor all the Coalition soldiers as well. We also thank them for their sacrifice and bravery in bringing democracy to those who’ve never known it.

In Honor of Those Who Made the Ultimate Sacrifice

just an ordinary day, not even close to September so I think it makes it the best day to set this goal. Not only to remember 9/11 but to NEVER FORGET.

I guess I hould not be surprised that there is only one other person with this goal. A poll taken shows that Americans are forgetting and even forgetting the images of that horrific day.

I am not making a political statement this is a only a reminder that We should NEVER FORGET.

All you need to do is look at this video and you too will remember and possibly make it a goal for yourself to NEVER FORGET.

I hate remembering the smell. I vector around the firehouse on my block because I don’t want to see the flowers. The radio goes on all day with rememberances. I don’t need to cry on the way to work when I see dress whites. I don’t need extra tension and sadness. It happened! There are things happening now that are worse!

Please move on. Leave me out of it. I don’t want to be pulled back into the worst weeks of my life.

Even though I was only in second grade… you see. I had to learn about what happened by myself. Nobody really had the guts to tell a little kid what happened until… never. I found out by myself. I was confused why every year we had to have “moments of silence” were all about. I guess my parents just thought I knew. But up until 4th grade I didn’t. Then I did. Wow, I cannot believe it was 6 years ago, it feels like yesterday to me. My mom crying when she was watching the news, my teachers everywhere all over the place at school, my dad clutching onto me when he got to my school. Quite hectic… scary. But I found out from watching the news. The news has been a miracle for me in my life because I actually watch it a lot. I always see it and that’s how I’m up to date on what’s happening. Usually before my parents now… but anywho… at the time we (family) lived in New Jersey and were only 10-20 minutes away from the World Trade Center. My dad actually has to pass by there on his way to work. But he commuted me to my PA school every single day. Exhausting stuff for the whole family. So, anyways 2 years from that day, I found out from CNN and I nearly broke down. How could anyone not tell me? that was all that was ringing through my head. How was i so naive?

But all those questions concerning my thoughts went away. It’s not me who had to go through that disaster. So, 4 years from 4th grade, I’m about to turn 13 and my aunt is down for a visit. She wants to go to New York because she has never been there before. Sure, I think, it’s not like I haven’t been to New York before. So when we get there she says she wants to go to the remains of the Trade Center.

Is she kidding me?

I didn’t want to do that, and I still don’t. But I was brought against my will. It’s not like I’m afraid of confronting that. I didn’t lose anyone nor did I live in New York. But it just sickens me that people are almost turning it into a tourist site. I saw buses go by with the New York tours. Here is where thousands of people died in the 9/11 attacks. in a cheerful voice. It just disgusted me how people could smile in front of it and take a picture. My aunt did. And so did my cousin. But my cousin’s only little. My Aunt should know better. She told me “Katie, it’s a shame, I thought we could actually go in and look at what’s left.”

!!! is she serious? That’s not what the shame is! And even if they did let us, I wouldn’t go. I couldn’t bare looking at a place where so many people left this earth and went to Heaven… even if that’s a better place.

So here’s my opinion… after a good year of thinking, I decided that in 5th grade, I wouldn’t look at my life as others do. With selfishness and a little greed that their lives are important. Which is true in ways, but I’m putting more people ahead of me, and trying to love. Not hate. That’s what’s important in this world. To love eachother. And that maybe we should look out for eachother, and nobody saw it coming, despite what the conspiracists say, I think it’s a scary thing that nobody wanted to happen. Even if they had “reasons”...

Yet, for some reason, I don’t think it was enough to start a war. Sure, I’m mad it happened, and if I was president I’d want revenge too. But is that any way to solve it? More violence? The cost of even more american lives?

Anyways, that’s really all I can say for now. But until then God Bless America and let us love eachother not as friends and family, but as equals. God’s Looking Over Us

LOVE

and say a prayer for our brave troops protecting us from this happening again.

It has been very somber today. The sky is gray and overcast. I can only imagine how the families of the 9/11 victims feel today.

It is such a terrible loss and America will be trying to heal for a very long time. I know that I am still healing from it. It was the day that my world as I knew it came apart as if someone shattered the rose colored glass out of my soul’s window.

It left me more human then I had ever felt, because until that point, I was living in my own little world, apart from the collective group of other humans that live miles away from me. It made me realize that anything can happen, and no matter I try to see good in everybody, unfortunately it is not always so.

America still lies broken, trying to gather up the pieces of what she once was, knowing that it will never, never be the same. I can see the devestation of the the cruel act that happened six years ago today every where I go. The way people must think now, always on edge, not wanting to become caught unawares, like we once where, yet always admitting on the deeping ache of the loss. The loss of innocents.

Our country has grown. We are no longer the young, untried child that is always happy and bright. Yes, we have suffered our wars and our tragedies, but not one so deep. I was not alive when the attack of Pearl Harbor happened but when that happened, America suffered yet matured.

The sobering fact is that I matured greatly from expeirecing the tragedy of 9/11. The cornerstone of character is learning from suffering no matter the loss. It molds us, just as 9/11 has molded us all in some way.

Romans 5: 1 – 11
Tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance character, and character hope and hope does not disappoint.

We still feel the tremors of the aftershocks of 9/11 in our everyday lives. Some feel it more then others. It was just last night when I was watching the Disney’s Oliver and Company when I gasped when I saw the World Trade Towers in animation.

My heart aches with the reminder of the loss of life, the loss of love, the loss of the world we thought we knew. I just didn’t understand and I still dont’ understand now, after 6 years. WHY?

I know I might never understand, yet I will live with the pain that many, many, many other’s carry as I do. A silent aching that remains constant, especially any time I got to the airport to fly, or checked out by a guard in the Courthouse to make sure I am not smuggling in anything dangerous that might hurt those around me.

I cry out now more loudly on this day, that God might hear the hundreds of thousands that walk somberly today and the thousands that still cry nightly, forever mourning the loved ones lost. Husbands, wifes, sisters and brothers. Sons, daughters, Fathers and Mothers. Cousins, Neighbors, and friends.

God grant us some type of peace as we learn to cope and live with the past that has wounded us so greatly.

I have not just taken one day to remember the horrible tragedy that happened 5 years ago. It doesn’t seem like 5 years to me, it just seem like it happened yesterday. I am sure it is because it has made such an impact on my life that it isn’t far from my mind. The families that lost loved ones and how they are forced to move on with their lives without them.

I can not relate to losing a love one like that, beacause it has never happened to me, yet I am very empathic to those people that have lost someone. It is almost like it has happened to me.

It just blows my mind that another human being would plan such a distruction of innocent people. I sometimes pity Osama because I wonder if he has very truly felt love by another person. Maybe if he had, this might not have ever come about.

I am so sorry for those families. I don’t allow many people close to my heart, and if I were to lose what I only have. I probably would curl up and die. It would seem like the end of the world, which it did seem that day.

My prayers and thoughts still go out to those families who have lost their loved ones on that day. My heart will always hold that memory close and a tear will always be shed.

Liberty or death, what we so proudly hail
Once you provoke her, rattling of her tail
Never begins it, never, but once engaged…
Never surrenders, showing the fangs of rage

Dont tread on me

So be it
Threaten no more
To secure peace is to prepare for war
So be it
Settle the score
Touch me again for the words that youll hear evermore…

Dont tread on me

Love it or live it, she with the deadly bite
Quick is the blue tongue, forked as lighting strike
Shining with brightness, always on surveillance
The eyes, they never close, emblem of vigilance

Dont tread on me

So be it
Threaten no more
To secure peace is to prepare for war
So be it
Settle the score
Touch me again for the words that youll hear evermore…

Dont tread on me

So be it
Threaten no more
To secure peace is to prepare for war

Liberty or death, what we so proudly hail
Once you provoke her, rattling on her tail

So be it
Threaten no more
To secure peace is to prepare for war
So be it
Settle the score
Touch me again for the words that youll hear evermore…

Dont tread on me

Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day
Out in the yard with your wife and children
Working on some stage in LA
Did you stand there in shock at the site of
That black smoke rising against that blue sky
Did you shout out in anger
In fear for your neighbor
Or did you just sit down and cry

Did you weep for the children
Who lost their dear loved ones
And pray for the ones who don’t know
Did you rejoice for the people who walked from the rubble
And sob for the ones left below

Did you burst out in pride
For the red white and blue
The heroes who died just doing what they do
Did you look up to heaven for some kind of answer
And look at yourself to what really matters

I’m just a singer of simple songs
I’m not a real political man
I watch CNN but I’m not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love

Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day
Teaching a class full of innocent children
Driving down some cold interstate
Did you feel guilty cause you’re a survivor
In a crowded room did you feel alone
Did you call up your mother and tell her you love her
Did you dust off that bible at home
Did you open your eyes and hope it never happened
Close your eyes and not go to sleep
Did you notice the sunset the first time in ages
Speak with some stranger on the street
Did you lay down at night and think of tomorrow
Go out and buy you a gun
Did you turn off that violent old movie you’re watching
And turn on “I Love Lucy” reruns
Did you go to a church and hold hands with some stranger
Stand in line and give your own blood
Did you just stay home and cling tight to your family
Thank God you had somebody to love

I’m just a singer of simple songs
I’m not a real political man
I watch CNN but I’m not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love

I’m just a singer of simple songs
I’m not a real political man
I watch CNN but I’m not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love

The greatest is love
The greatest is love

Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day

American Girls and American Guys
We’ll always stand up and salute
We’ll always recognize
When we see Old Glory Flying
There’s a lot of men dead
So we can sleep in peace at night
When we lay down our head

My daddy served in the army
Where he lost his right eye
But he flew a flag out in our yard
Until the day that he died
He wanted my mother, my brother, my sister and me
To grow up and live happy
In the land of the free.

Now this nation that I love
Has fallen under attack
A mighty sucker punch came flyin’ in
From somewhere in the back
Soon as we could see clearly
Through our big black eye
Man, we lit up your world
Like the 4th of July

Hey Uncle Sam
Put your name at the top of his list
And the Statue of Liberty
Started shakin’ her fist
And the eagle will fly
Man, it’s gonna be hell
When you hear Mother Freedom
Start ringin’ her bell
And it feels like the whole wide world is raining down on you
Brought to you Courtesy of the Red White and Blue

Justice will be served
And the battle will rage
This big dog will fight
When you rattle his cage
And you’ll be sorry that you messed with
The U.S. of A.
`Cause we`ll put a boot in your ass
It`s the American way

Hey Uncle Sam
Put your name at the top of his list
And the Statue of Liberty
Started shakin’ her fist
And the eagle will fly
Man, it’s gonna be hell
When you hear Mother Freedom
Start ringin’ her bell
And it feels like the whole wide world is raining down on you
Brought to you Courtesy of the Red White and Blue