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One Nation

... our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor. 9/11

Sep 11, 2011 by Bonnie Simon

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Has it really been 10 years?

I know we all remember where we were. I had just started a new job, fresh out of graduate school and ready to take on the world. In the years since then, I’ve wondered if 9/11 played a role in my shifting focus, in my disillusionment with the corporate world. How could I expend so much energy climbing the corporate ladder when my homefront needed protection?

My first sign that something was amiss came in the form of an incredulous comment by a coworker, “The World Trade Center has been hit by an airplane!”. Some of us sought out the televisions scattered throughout the building. Some of us kept on working, but none of us suspected an attack until the second plane hit. America, we thought, is safe.

I should not have been so surprised. I had spent a significant amount of time in Israel, a place where a bag abandoned in a public place stirs a lot of anxious attention and people take seriously the responsibilities of an alert citizenry. I had become accustomed to the young soldiers walking public streets carrying their guns and I had seen the barbed wire fences on the beaches of naval bases. I knew firsthand how hostility can lurk in unexpected places.

And yet, I was as surprised as anyone else.

Our bosses let us go home once the intention behind the out-of-control airplanes became clear. My husband and I spend the rest of the day watching the television, stunned by the sudden, forced shift in worldview. I remember how my heart ached for the widows and orphans, the heartbreaking stories of final phone calls from the burning towers and the redeeming bravery of police, firefighters and ordinary people helping each other.

Nothing pulls people together like a common enemy. Americans felt like Americans for a while, in a way I had never seen and haven’t seen since. Most of that effect has worn off and we are as polarized as ever today. Politics has become a bitter battle, states are referred to by their colors and our military is mired in a controversial war. Sometimes it seems as though we could split into different countries.

I hope we don’t. Your fellow Americans may believe different things, champion different causes, follow different religions and value different ideas, but as a people we remain worthy of the last statement of the Declaration of Independence.

“And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”

We owe it to ourselves and each other to make the most out of adversity, to build ourselves back up from heartbreak as a stronger people. Remember today that those brave police, firefighters and ordinary people are still out there. Let them remind you that for all our disagreements, the homefront belongs to all of us.

The National 9/11 Flag

About the Author

Bonnie Simon Has Written 35 Articles For Us!

I am an urban homesteader in Colorado Springs, CO where I raise chickens, make my own yogurt and am learning to grow some food, all within sight of downtown in a 1950s era neighborhood. I am starting a small business designed to fill the gap between local farms and local dinner tables.

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