It has been nine years since the twin-towers were destroyed; nine years since my world was shaken. The morning of Sept 11, 2001, had started off oddly by any normal measure; we had two stray dogs in our front yard that wouldn't go away and whom Lisa and I decided to try and help for a bit before we headed for work and to take Shannon to daycare. After walking around the neighborhood for a bit we returned home and received a phone call from an elder neighbor telling us to turn on the TV. He wouldn't explain just insisted we turn it on. So we did and every channel was showing the same horrifying image of one of the two towers smoking and on fire with a huge gash torn into the structure. The other tower hadn't been hit yet.

I sat, stunned, by what I was seeing. I was in complete disbelief and I wondered if I was being punked in the vein of H.G. Wells "War of the Worlds". Sadly, as we all know now, it wasn't some cruel prank; it was a very real tragedy.

Eventually I managed to get up and go to work. By then the entire nations fleet of planes had been grounded, the second tower had been hit, the pentagon had been hit, and another plane had been destroyed in a field in Pennsylvania. I was furious and focusing on work was exceptionally hard. We had one TV in the building, in our meeting room,and someone had tuned it to a news channel. I often found myself back in the conference room staring blankly at the destruction, learning about the personal tragedies that had been happening at the tower as people opted for the non-chance to live by jumping out of the windows from over one hundred floors in the air. Each little tidbit of information that managed to reach into my clouded brain just kept making me more and more angry. I wanted to do something, to lash out and someone, to exact furious vengeance upon those who would attack us. I imagine, I felt very much like an American on Dec 8 1941 when everyone discovered what had happened a day prior at Perl Harbor. I was ready to storm into my local recruiters office and sign up to go kill the brazen mother-fuckers who were willing to attack my country.

Of course I didn't rejoin the Army. I had a wife and a six month old daughter to think about - I couldn't just take off and try to fight in a war without thinking about them and, honestly, the two of them meant more to me than getting revenge. Had I been single there is no doubt in my mind that I would have left my job that day and re-enlisted. I didn't care who was responsible I just wanted to lash out at them.

Eventually I calmed down. I have never let go of that anger though; whenever I think about what happened on that day I find myself just as shocked and angry as I did then. Growing up I can remember my parents referencing the day President Kennedy was shot as a day they could never forgot; 9-11 is that day for me. I hope that my children are never able to mark time by a tragedy; instead it is my sincerest wish that they always mark their memories with times of joy and happiness.

#Commentary