9/11 - One man's recollections - Granite Grok

9/11 – One man’s recollections

9/11/2001.  8:45am I had just driven from my hamlet down for a visit to my company’s MA based office – laptop upgrade, software upgrade by IT, chat with a couple of sales folks to see what help I could be technically for pitches to be made, face time with other tech folks to swap stories and see what was flashing.

Getting out of the Suburban, the radio crackled news that I could not believe.  Hurrying into the office, I phoned home – I’m OK, what’s on the TV?  Confirmation.  Into the office, plugged in the net and immediately tried to stream a local radio station (er, that was a new thing back then – most people thought I was nuts).  Grabbed the TV normally used for training, literally reshaped some coat hangers, and got a local Boston station.

A small crowd gathered, one or two at first.  Then more. A normally bustling office slowly became silent as the whispers went around and people gathered to see the images, images that we never thought we would see and certainly not on our national soil.  Horror filled the room as the first news of jumpers reached us.

The second plane hit…and there was silence.  And then a groaning, followed quiet by cursing.  People watched, transfigured at history in the making and the horror of the moment.  I heard sobbing.

At that, one by one desks emptied and what seemed to be the entire facility was now grouped around that jury-rigged tv with the scratchy sound and the sometimes snowy picture.  But that was enough – we all knew what had happened and what it really meant even as none of knew exactly what it meant.

One by one, the crowd grew smaller; things were gathered up, desktop PCs shut down, monitors shut off, and desks tidied up.  Managers looked the other way, and then did the same.  I packed up, put the TV away, walked down the stairs, called home to say I was fine and heading to the highway.

Coming through the door, …


…I hugged TMEW and then hugged my boys.  We all watched the TV as Ground Zero became the national focus, and the Pentagon, and the United flight "Let’s roll" became a rallying cry.  Life would change for me – simple ones at first, work changed as trips were cancelled and contracts suspended -as a techie, I remember watching the video of ATC (Air Traffic Control) shutting down US air space – and shivered.  It took a while, but noise became data, which in turned became patterns, and patterns became knowledge.  That was the least of it.

It came home, personal. No, I did not personally know anyone that was killed that day.  But who knew that in a few short years, my boys would be hugging me as staff sergeants drove them off to go to their respective boot camps. My sons served in that fight – and I count myself as one of the lucky ones as they have returned home mostly safe.  One still serves – and all talk aside, may find himself once again at the tip of the spear.

For better or for worse, America woke up after being punched in the nose and reacted.  Some still say it was our own fault for being ugly Americans at best and Imperialistic at worst.  Others have hold, I included, that we were attacked for our freedoms that allow us to decide how to live our lives for ourselves. That debate started long before, the change is that it as intensified, we will continue to have it going forward.

Ten years later – What do I know?  Bin Laden is dead but his Islamofascist movement, even after having taking severe losses in Iraq and Afghanistan, still lives on.  To degrees, we have lost individual freedoms but we have not been attacked on our soil.  Yes, there are those that have and are taking personal advantage from this attack, but a greater number that have stood up and went forth to protect our nation.  Yet, we as a nation seem incapable of actually naming the threat, relying on the politically correct euphemism "War on Terror" instead of openly and publicly stating that we are in a clash of future vision: one of Classical Western Liberalism vs one of an Islamic fascist Caliphate and that "terror" is merely a tactic and not a war.  We fight a war not against a State and its army; rather, we fight against a political ideology wrapped up in religious trappings and uses our own freedoms, traditions, and institutions against us.  Will we prevail, or have we become such a hollowed out society that we can no longer defend our own philosophical underpinnings?

And frankly, we fight not just that threat to Classic Western Liberalism and the Founding Fathers vision of individual freedom and Liberty from the Islamists but from inside from Progressives that willing trade freedom for security in an Administrative State that might not be much different than a Caliphate.

Sorrow?  Yes, that even with all of our "progress", that there is no progress in that there will always be those that there will be those that have no compunction about using force against innocents to force their will upon others.  No surprise – it has always been that way, and I am certain that it will never change.

What is to come?  No one knows.  However, I do echo the song-as-prayer – asking God "to shed his Grace upon Thee".  He has blessed this nation, and I believe He created this nation – and only He knows what will happen next.

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