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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 9/11/2003 8:06 AM (GMT -6) |   | Where were you on 9-11?
Initially, I was on my way to my adviser's office. He had been on sabbatical and we hadn't talked about my dissertation in person for over a year. It was in the morning and there was talk of a plane flying into the first world trade center and then the second and that something had caused an explosion at the white house.
I had heard about the first tower crashing when I went in to my advisor's office. He had then told me that he didn't think I had made enough progress to be done that year, when his wife called and told him the second sears tower had crashed. He laughed nervously, but I was immobile. My own tower was about to crash. It was my fifth year in grad school and if you take more than five years to finish your PhD, this is commonly interpreted as a "bad" signal and so your employment prospects prove to be far lower.
I didn't get to grieve, then. I spent the next month learning to rewrite and improving my exposition of my draft. Then a month later I found out one of my papers was accepted for publication in a good journal and my advisor agreed to let me go on the market and, eventually, I got my current job at the "Yale" of Mexico, teaching Mexico's future leaders...
dlw
ps, I have a nine-year-old sister, who I had watch the silent film, "The Passion of Joan of Arc" with my family once. She recalled the scene of Joan burning at the stake on 9-11. Now she only likes films that have happy endings.
dlw
Niebuhr thought that sustained moral energy in politics depended on religion's power to mobilize reason along with self-transcending love. The prophetic tradition, meanwhile, gave Jews and Christians some protection against the temptation to identify their social causes with God's will. Lincoln's second inaugural address expressed the prophetic insight, "The almighty has His own purposes." | | Back to Top | | |
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Blood Washed Heretic
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2003
Total Posts : 167
| Posted 9/11/2003 8:34 AM (GMT -6) | | I was waking up late for chapel services (as usual), when a friend came in and asked, "Is it World War III?" Having just gotten out of bed, my roommate and I looked at him increduously. "What are you talking about?"
"Somebody bombed the Pentagon and the World Trade Center."
Not knowing what to make of this, I went ahead and got dressed and prepared to head across campus. I never left my dorm. In the lobby, about twenty people were crowded around the TV. I realized what was happening just as the second tower fell. I sat transfixed for the next two hours as reports and speculation began pouring in.
The whole day was surreal, and still is as I look back on it. I prayed, wept, and meditated. I feared for my nation's safety, but I also feared what terrible response would be unleashed from the world's only superpower. I never would have imagined that two wars would follow in the next two years without the perpetrators being caught. I had more faith in the US military and intelligence community than that...
Today, however, I simply weep for the families of those lost.
I have some more reflections in my blog, you can read it by clicking my homepage icon.
In essentials, unity; In matters of opinion, liberty; In all things, love. | | Back to Top | | |
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honorman
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1137
| Posted 9/11/2003 12:17 PM (GMT -6) | | I was doing what I usually do on such a morning, so I have no "great" recollections, other than my sister calling me to tell me about it.
I was affected greatly, but most of what the commentators of that day said were wrong; our lives have basically returned to being normal...I remember one of them said life in US had changed forever. It always does, doesn't it?
But some basic thoughts:
I will always be thankful to channels such as Nick, the Cartoon Network and others who were not sucked into the "news" void and didn't feel the need to give us every gruesome detail. I will forever feel anger towards our sporting leagues who took the "PC" way out. Most people I know would have appreciated some time off. Instead, by and large, we had tragedy slammed down our throats.
Two years later, I go about my life. I do not "weep" for people (I cry), but I find it near impossible to cry for those I have no grounds with. No one i know personally died. I do not pretend to have grief for people I do not know. I am sad for their families, but I have a life to live. Harsh reality but true.
Some of them were heros, but not all. Some simply got caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Like in car accidents. The reason people label this such a great tragedy is because it happened to us, but all of the families were well cared for and the people who died, by and large, lived lives of priviledge when compared to the rest of the world. When I took a step back, I found I had more sadness for those in Rwanda and other such countries who lived in poverty and then were ruthlessly slaughtered.
Finally, people talked about the charity of americans in the wake. But the simple fact is that money giving dropped off in the wake of the giving to 911 victims and many charities who were counting on the money had to close.
It reminds me of giving to AIDS. Or money for research for breast cancer. Nobel causes. But millions of children died through out the world for want of basis things our children get because it isn't PC to give to such a thing.
Most of the victims of the 911 tragedy had good insurance, most were very well covered. Yet the money given to them was taken away from others who needed it. People die everyday; yet no one is raising money for them.
Good and bad came out of 911. But from my viewpoint it turned into another newsflash to exploit. We americans are so myoptic. Our tragedy is global because we make it that way. And, yes, in a way it was global. But not because of how horrible it was, but because other countries rely on us so much. That was one of the truly wonderful things about 911. So many of our friends were truly sad for what happened to us.
Postnote: people who die in a tragedy are not heros just because they died. There were heros in 911 but not all who died were heros. Most were simply victims, people who died at the hands of another, through no fault of their own. That does not mean they are heros. Heros are defined by deeds done, not because they died, not simply because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. We would do well to remember this, lest the word "hero" past into the catalogy of "superstar." | | Back to Top | | |
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Tigress
Registered Member
Date Joined Feb 2003
Total Posts : 1252
| Posted 9/15/2003 6:12 AM (GMT -6) | | On the morning of September 11, 2001 I, as usual, slept in too long and was late for work. I never listen to the radio or watch TV when I'm getting ready in the morning (I like it quiet) and when I got into my car to drive to work, I remember hearing people on the radio saying something about the Middle East, but I just popped in a tape and thought to myself that there's always something bad happening in the Middle East and I didn't feel like hearing about it.
Once I got to work, my co-workers were all standing in and outside one of our conference rooms, watching a small TV in there, and after I got settled in, I went over and said, "What's going on?"
My co-worker had tears in her eyes and said, "You haven't heard? Some planes crashed into the World Trade Center."
I was absolutely astounded. My dad, who is an accountant for the IRS, had just been in one of the WTC buildings (not the two big towers, but one of the smaller buildings next to them) the week before, taking a continuing ed. class. My parents were at Yellowstone when the attacks actually happened. They were not sure if they'd be able to fly back to Chicago or not. But, their vacation went a few more days before they were scheduled to go home, and by that time the planes were flying again.
My mom acted so nervous at the baggage check that they selected her to scan for weapons before getting on the plane, and during the flight, my parents and other passengers were nervous because there were some Middle Eastern men on the plane.
It's interesting to see how people react to certain situations. I was so indifferent towards what I thought was just another news story about the Middle East when I first turned on the radio in my car that morning. But, once it happened to us here, I knew I should never treat anyone's situation as less important than my own.
Tigress 
"Name a shrub after me. Preferably one that's prickly and difficult to eradicate."
-Captain Jack Aubrey
"Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World" | | Back to Top | | |
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