We remember

Every September I have two pieces of writing to do -- one for ASA News and Notes, where I write a monthly column; and the other, since 2007, here on this personal blog.

We are a country that has, with notable exceptions at Pearl Harbor and 9/11, never had planes flying overhead, crashing into buildings or ships, and/or dropping bombs on us.  Until that Tuesday in 2001, we had not really been tested.  Like Pearl Harbor, our collective memory is long.

I remember and salute the first responders who gave everything that day, who brought out those who lived, and to those who dug through the rubble to bring out their brothers and sisters.  Many of them have since died from the effects of the rubble they searched through for their comrades.

We hold up photos, then and now.  We remember as best we can the thousands who just happened to have been in the wrong place at the wrong time that day.

I am still waiting for the Ground Zero Museum to be finished.  Until then we have a large plaza with trees and two fountains on the site.  While the policeman in the first photo is saluting the fountain that outlines the base footprint of one of the two World Trade Center buildings, the hand in this last photos holds up an outline of the lost buildings on an overlay.

We will never forget what happened that day.