This Is Not HBO
September 11, 2001 8:37 AM
I walk into the house after a monster night shift. Just glad to be back in the house, safe and sound. I kick off my filthy shoes on the porch. Birds are chirping, oblivious to what is about to happen 1000 miles away. I really need a new pair of boots. The work yard where I put my truck in is a mix of grease, blood, and clay that will tarnish whatever gets in its way.
I turn on the television, just to hear the sounds of something that will put me to sleep. Wow, that’s a really cool special effect I just saw. I have watched Independence Day just in bits and pieces, but I had no idea that CNN was involved in the movie. Usually they use a fake name, like MNN or something bogus. I look up into the right hand box of the big screen, and see the words LIVE.
LIVE.
Not Will Smith coming out to save the day, not Bruce Willis walking across glass, but the silence of the usually brash Big 3 (Brokaw, Jennings, and Rather) not saying a word. I have been on rocky terms with my parents for years, but call every now and again just to let them know that I am alive. I instantly called my father, asking if this is real or not. Two minutes into the conversation, I am shocked to see with my own eyes another plane go into tower 2. This has now become real, as real as the marriage to my wife, as real as the death of my brother, as real as the birth of my daughter. I don’t even say goodbye to my Dad. I just hang up. What am I going to say? I watch in horror as they show people hanging off the ledges, and I think of what I would do if I were in their shoes.
I have to be to work in less than 11 hours and couldn’t care less. All I want to do is get my wife and kid, find a hole in the ground, and stay there. Even though I am so far away from it, I feel as though I am only a block away. I can’t tell you if someone is speaking on the TV or not. You could be right in front of me and I wouldn’t hear you. It only took a matter of minutes to see a picture of the suspected terrorists. I sat by myself, cursing, using every racist name I could think of, not caring if anyone heard me or not.
It was only a matter of time before I wondered if the two buildings I had never seen before with my own eyes, but have seen just about every day through TV, would stay up. My fears turned into a nightmare, watching them fall. Coming to the hard, cold realization that we got hit. I had become so desensitized to the fact that in my lifetime, WE DID THE BOMBING. No one touched us, until that day.
I eventually passed out on the sofa out of sheer exhaustion, to awake two hours later by my kid walking in the front door since everyone was sent home early. How do I explain this to her, when really, I don’t know myself what to think.
Frankly, I still don’t.
Now, in the year 2005, I still don’t think much has changed. I still hear the song “Gods of War” from Def Leppard in my head, and to this day it’s still relevant. War, hunger, flooding, hurricanes, famine in countries that we send millions to, but let warlords get the shipment. NOTHING HAS CHANGED. Not in the big picture in life, at least not in my eyes.
When I write on topics like this I can feel the emotions, the same ones as that day, coming out of me. I feel really pissed off inside, but it will subside. Just like on that day, all the hurt that our nation felt, will heal itself. With time.
I take that back. I know of one thing that has changed since that day.
I have changed.
I am more tolerant of things that I used to not be able to let go of. I am more respectful of people who aren’t like or look like me, and I have learned to let go of the things that I cannot change. Will I ever forget the feelings of that day? NEVER.
I will, though, think of the pain the day has caused, and try to use it in my own life to better myself and my family. Give a little love to someone. All they can do is reject it. Shake the hand of someone who needs to feel like a man again. Support your local community, or do whatever you feel, for just one minute a day. Ihat could actually be a positive thing in your and someone else’s life. It doesn’t take your checkbook to do positive things. It takes passion, and your heart, to do that.
Never forget,
Manimal Lector
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