September 11 remembrances have been flowing all week, online and off. It’s hard to believe that it’s been 25 years since that awful day. The anniversary seems especially poignant this time, given the wearisome animosity that increasingly plagues America and the world.
The horrific destruction on that day in 2001 forever claimed a place on the short list of events that I will always remember—where I was, what I was doing, and how my world changed. September 11 indelibly joins November 22, 1963 when John F. Kennedy was assassinated, the Mt. St. Helens eruption of May 18, 1980, the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion on January 28, 1986, and the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
An even more vivid memory than September 11 itself, for me, is what happened during the days that followed.
First, the silence. I walked along the Niobrara River in north-central Nebraska and heard . . . nothing. No wind in the trees, no birdsong, no airplanes rumbling from 30,000 feet above. Even the rippling water seemed subdued.
The humans around me went quiet, too. The constant buzz of conversation paused. Arguments stopped. People appeared lost in thought.
And then something remarkable happened: we reached out to one another. People looked beyond their petty differences, mended fences, donated blood, helped strangers. We remembered who we are and aspired, however briefly, to what we can be.
I know we can do this again. And it’s time.
Image by Alexas_Fotos from Pixabay
#neverforget #September11 #rememberwhoweare #wecandothis
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