9/11/01 - Nine Years Later

No matter how hard you may want to try, you can't forget where you were that day...

Personally I can't believe that it was nine years ago that I was a senior in high school, sitting in Journalism class waiting for the bell to ring to go to my next period Algebra class. It was towards the end of class that Mr. Swisher (one of the guidance counselors) came into the room and told our teacher Mr. Levan to turn on the TV. It took a while to sink in at just what I was seeing on the television screen that morning, something that still seems so unbelievable even to this day nine years later.

In the nine years since 9/11, what's really changed and what has really been accomplished? We went to war (which for all intents and purposes hasn't and won't end, regardless of whatever "official" declarations are made) and what did it solve? Nine years, a gasoline crisis, raging prices, and a shitty global economy...other than all that, nothing has changed.

The horror of 9/11 is something that by all rights and purposes should have united us as a people and brought us together, but instead all that it did was amplify racial and religious prejudices and further divide us as a country. Left wings, right wings, conservatives, liberals, Tea-Party douche bags, whatever...we always find a way to label a group of people, when what we should have done is attempt to achieve everything we can to overcome and abolish labels and unite regardless of any skin color or theological differences. Instead, here we are as a people getting pissed off over a mosque being built around Ground Zero (which in all honesty can be understood, but that's a topic for another day) and an asshole pastor in Florida wanting to burn Qurans to garner media attention.

Next year will be a decade since 9/11. A decade...let that sink in. It's hard to believe that it will be ten years next year since everything changed. Even harder to believe that after such a tragic event, we would be characterized by a presidency that only further crippled us as an economic power and a country as a whole, followed by a president who has been marketed as being a glimmer of hope and that has only thus far turned out to be a hype-heavy media magnet. Regardless of what side you classify yourself as, it can be agreed upon here that nine years ago today all those innocent people and the heroes who risked and sacrificed their lives trying to save them all died senselessly...and any honoring of their memory only gets shit on more and more each passing year that we continue not to truly unite and set our differences aside for the greater good, as cliche' as that may sound.

As it stands right now, united or divided, we fall.

In loving memory of all those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001.