beast of the east
Active member
Once again, Redmen.com goes offline for 24 hours in observance of what for many of us, was the worst event of our lives. If you are like me, you probably were reminded of 9-11 simply by logging in here, which I did shortly before midnight on the 10th when redmen.com was already locked down.
I'm reminded of the quote I saw on a hand painted sign on a railing outside a church in Copley Square in Boston in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings. The railing was adorned with thousands of ribbons placed there in memoriam for those who perished, were maimed, or lost loved ones in that horrific display of subhuman behavior.
"All the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of one candle" was printed on the sign.
There were so many extraordinary acts of human goodness on 9-11-2001 and the weeks and months and years that followed. My own reflection yesterday was on those actions.
I've retained a boiling anger against those perpetrators and the ideology that would execute 3000+ innocent civilians on that day. I was actually relieved when I heard Mayor Giuliani speak yesterday morning and say that it is still his predominant emotion, because in all these years I have refused to visit Ground Zero, despite the fact that my long deceased father (coincidentally he died on 9-12 many years ago) had worked as an iron worker to construct the World Trade Center. I have just refused to see that site as anything but an indication of the worst of humanity, and needed no reminders of the planes striking the buildings, or the scenes of horror as people jumped off buildings or fled in the thick fog of debris when the buildings tumbled. I remember that a large cloud of smoke that framed the city skyline that kept billowing for weeks after the site was reduced to a cauldron.
But yesterday at least, I listened to how the Navy Seals looked at their mission to take out Bin Laden as a one-way mission, that they would surely perish invading the compound where Bin Laden was protected. I listened as one of them told a doubting comrade about the reasons for the mission, "Look when we signed up for military service dying in service of our country was a possibility. The 3000 civilians that died on 9-11 made no such promise." The same seal was driven to avenge the death of a woman who jumped to avoid the 2500 degree flames getting closer and closer and as she plummeted towards the pavement held her skirt firmly so not to be seen in an embarrassing final moments of her life."
Thousands of other stories, of firemen and cops rushing into a building where others were fleeing. Of many off duty cops and firemen rushed into the city to be of help. Our town lost a volunteer EMT who did the same and died. A poor woman who owned nothing brought bags of ice she made in her freezer every day to provide some relief to workers frantically digging in the rubble for possible survivors or bodies. How police and firefighters from across the nation used their personal vacation time and rushed to NYC to help in the relief effort, driving long hours cross country.
Literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions of bright candles helping to extinguish the darkness perpetrated by a small number of hate filled individuals who allowed an evil ideology to destroy their own humanity before they destroyed themselves and thousands others.
I recalled how unified Americans were that day. I believed America, in the midst of political divisiveness at the time, would never be the same. I thought that from that day forward we would have learned that our own political differences were much narrower than the aggregate belief that our nation, albeit imperfect, had far more good and in common not to work together for a more perfect union.
Maybe we are all just a work in progress, and observances like yesterday help to unite us and end our divisiveness.
I'm reminded of the quote I saw on a hand painted sign on a railing outside a church in Copley Square in Boston in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings. The railing was adorned with thousands of ribbons placed there in memoriam for those who perished, were maimed, or lost loved ones in that horrific display of subhuman behavior.
"All the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of one candle" was printed on the sign.
There were so many extraordinary acts of human goodness on 9-11-2001 and the weeks and months and years that followed. My own reflection yesterday was on those actions.
I've retained a boiling anger against those perpetrators and the ideology that would execute 3000+ innocent civilians on that day. I was actually relieved when I heard Mayor Giuliani speak yesterday morning and say that it is still his predominant emotion, because in all these years I have refused to visit Ground Zero, despite the fact that my long deceased father (coincidentally he died on 9-12 many years ago) had worked as an iron worker to construct the World Trade Center. I have just refused to see that site as anything but an indication of the worst of humanity, and needed no reminders of the planes striking the buildings, or the scenes of horror as people jumped off buildings or fled in the thick fog of debris when the buildings tumbled. I remember that a large cloud of smoke that framed the city skyline that kept billowing for weeks after the site was reduced to a cauldron.
But yesterday at least, I listened to how the Navy Seals looked at their mission to take out Bin Laden as a one-way mission, that they would surely perish invading the compound where Bin Laden was protected. I listened as one of them told a doubting comrade about the reasons for the mission, "Look when we signed up for military service dying in service of our country was a possibility. The 3000 civilians that died on 9-11 made no such promise." The same seal was driven to avenge the death of a woman who jumped to avoid the 2500 degree flames getting closer and closer and as she plummeted towards the pavement held her skirt firmly so not to be seen in an embarrassing final moments of her life."
Thousands of other stories, of firemen and cops rushing into a building where others were fleeing. Of many off duty cops and firemen rushed into the city to be of help. Our town lost a volunteer EMT who did the same and died. A poor woman who owned nothing brought bags of ice she made in her freezer every day to provide some relief to workers frantically digging in the rubble for possible survivors or bodies. How police and firefighters from across the nation used their personal vacation time and rushed to NYC to help in the relief effort, driving long hours cross country.
Literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions of bright candles helping to extinguish the darkness perpetrated by a small number of hate filled individuals who allowed an evil ideology to destroy their own humanity before they destroyed themselves and thousands others.
I recalled how unified Americans were that day. I believed America, in the midst of political divisiveness at the time, would never be the same. I thought that from that day forward we would have learned that our own political differences were much narrower than the aggregate belief that our nation, albeit imperfect, had far more good and in common not to work together for a more perfect union.
Maybe we are all just a work in progress, and observances like yesterday help to unite us and end our divisiveness.
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