The thing that really stands out in my memories of Sept 11, 2001, is the astonishing unity of the majority of Americans – sadness, love of country, enormous anger towards our enemies. Remember the members of Congress standing on the Capitol steps, singing God Bless America?
My friends, coworkers and I exchanged emails, as we tried to find ways we could help and honor those who had died in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. We joined in the candle lighting on the Friday after the attacks. We watched the service at the National Cathedral, where our President gave an uplifting address to the nation.
He said, “It is said that adversity introduces us to ourselves. This is true of a nation as well. In this trial, we have been reminded and the world has seen that our fellow Americans are generous and kind, resourceful and brave.
We see our national character in rescuers working past exhaustion, in long lines of blood donors, in thousands of citizens who have asked to work and serve in any way possible. And we have seen our national character in eloquent acts of sacrifice. ……… On this national day of prayer and remembrance, we ask almighty God to watch over our nation and grant us patience and resolve in all that is to come. We pray that He will comfort and console those who now walk in sorrow. We thank Him for each life we now must mourn, and the promise of a life to come. As we’ve been assured, neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities, nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth can separate us from God’s love. May He bless the souls of the departed. May He comfort our own. And may He always guide our country.”
It seemed that almost everyone wanted to contribute, to give money, give blood, or donate time, fly flags, say prayers, light candles. We were united as a country as we had not been for a long time.
One of the emails I received contained an editorial from a Romanian newspaper. Perhaps you received it too. I’m repeating it here because I think it is an interesting assessment by an outsider of what America means.
Editorial from a Romanian newspaper by Cornel Nistorescu
Why are Americans so united? They don’t resemble one another even if you paint them! They speak all the languages of the world and form an astonishing mixture of civilizations. Some of them are nearly extinct, others are incompatible with one another, and in matters of religious beliefs, not even God can count how many they are.
Still, the American tragedy turned three hundred million people into a hand put on the heart. Nobody rushed to accuse the White House, the army, the secret services that they are only a bunch of losers. Nobody rushed to empty their bank accounts. Nobody rushed on the streets nearby to gape about.
The Americans volunteered to donate blood and to give a helping hand. After the first moments of panic, they raised the flag on the smoking ruins, putting on T-shirts, caps and ties in the colours of the national flag. They placed flags on buildings and cars as if in every place and on every car a minister or the president was passing. On every occasion they started singing their traditional song: “God Bless America!”.
Silent as a rock, I watched the charity concert broadcast on Saturday once, twice, three times, on different tv channels. There were Clint Eastwood, Willie Nelson, Robert de Niro, Julia Roberts, Cassius Clay, Jack Nicholson, Bruce Springsteen, Silvester Stallone, James Wood, and many others whom no film or producers could ever bring together. The American’s solidarity spirit turned them into a choir. Actually, choir is not the word. What you could hear was the heavy artillery of the American soul. What neither George W. Bush, nor Bill Clinton, nor Colin Powell could say without facing the risk of stumbling over words and sounds, was being heard in a great and unmistakable way in this charity concert.
I don’t know how it happened that all this obsessive singing of America didn’t sound croaky, nationalist, or ostentatious! It made you green with envy because you weren’t able to sing for your country without running the risk of being considered chauvinist, ridiculous, or suspected of who-knows-what mean interests. I watched the live broadcast and the rerun of its rerun for hours listening to the story of the guy who went down one hundred floors with a woman in a wheelchair without knowing who she was, or of the Californian hockey player, who fought with the terrorists and prevented the plane from hitting a target that would have killed other hundreds of thousands of people.
How on earth were they able to bow before a fellow human? Imperceptibly, with every word and musical note, the memory of some turned into a modern myth of tragic heroes. And with every phone call, millions and millions of dollars were put in a collection aimed at rewarding not a man or a family, but a spirit which nothing can buy.
What on earth can unite the Americans in such a way? Their land? Their galloping history? Their economic power? Money? I tried for hours to find an answer, humming songs and murmuring phrases which risk of sounding like commonplaces. I thought things over, but I reached only one conclusion.
Only freedom can work such miracles!
NOTE: IT SHOULD NOT BE NECESSARY TO SAY SO, HOWEVER: NO COMMENTS ABOUT 9/11 CONSPIRACY THEORIES WILL BE ALLOWED HERE TODAY. THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.
Stella's Place 
My 911 memory is getting to work, hearing about it and just sitting at my computer, streaming it live and just staring…staring…staring. When I think about it I see myself from the back asvif I’m looking at soneobe else. I called my SSO at the Navy SCIF and thevfirst wirds out of her mouth were: “It’s bin Laden, isn’t it?”. Later that morning the director offered the rest of the day of to any employees who wanted it, only two people left on duty in my section were military/exmilitary.
Ten days later I received my orders for active duty and my 18-month battle with the USDA who didn’t want its employees going to active duty as it was an inconvenience to the supervisors and the employees who’d hsve yo ‘carry our load’.
LikeLiked by 4 people
I know I’ve mentioned it before but we had a Navy chaplain’s assistant who’d gotten off of active duty, stayed with the Reserves and went to eork for the USDA. As chaplains can’t carry weapons the assistant not only helps the chaplain with setting up and breaking down the services but accompanies the chsplain out into the field for services for military on the front lines and st obscure forward posts and serves as the chaplain’s bodyguard, frequently his only bodyguard.
The assistant was called to duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, a full year each time. Both times the USDA interpreted the regulations covering leave to process for activation so severely and twistedly, if that’s a word, the assistant was ready to quit. He didn’t belong to a unit, hecwas in an inactive reserve status but could still be called to duty until his initial eight year enlistment was up. He had to rely on Navy units over twenty miles from the office to do the processing during regular weekday work hours…theirs and his.
We took this all the way to USDA Hqs in DC and even there they interpreted the Federal rrhulstion in ways to discourage his use of military leave to process. He didn’t have a lot of personal leave and shouldn’t have to use it anyway. He didn’t want us to donate personal leave and ended up using whst littlebpersonsl leave he had and a dollop of leave without pay. To top it off, while he was gone they tried to eliminate his position so they’d have one less military reservist to deal with.
Your Federal government at work.
LikeLiked by 3 people
It’s still difficult for most everyone to read the emotion-packed human stories, or to see vids showing survivors relating their memories, or view the photos of those jumping from the towers. Harrowing…harrowing.
Some things that will stick in the mind forever…
I remember, perhaps not totally accurately, the man in the North Tower (the first building to be hit but the second to collapse) who followed his co-workers UP the stairs thinking they could be rescued on the roof. At one point they went into a suite of offices to get away from the stairwell smoke. Soon that room filled with smoke, too, and everyone laid down on the floor so the smoke rising to the ceiling would leave pockets of air for them to breathe until they were rescued. Instead they all began to pass out.
Suddenly, the man heard a voice saying strongly to him, “Get up, go back down the stairs, get out of the building NOW.” He ignored the voice but it was insistent. Finally he rose, stumbled into the stairwell, and began his incredible journey from near the top of the building to the mezzanine floor, perhaps some 90 stories(?). He went through debris, tremendous heat and smoke and came to a stop when part of the stairwell was gone. He jumped and made it, kept on going, and finally arrived at the mezzanine where a security guard directed him not to go out through the garden but to take the opposite exit. As he departed the building, he heard the roar of its collapse and was caught in the powdery debris cloud which filled his mouth and began choking him.
The next thing he remembered was being in the hospital. When his wife finally located him, she told the story of how she had fervently prayed that God would make him get out of the building. Seems she had been praying at the very moment he heard the voice. This man was the LAST person to get out of either building alive except those very few who were later pulled from the rubble.
For a long time afterwards he suffered from survivor’s guilt and refused to hear a word against those others who remained behind. He wanted no praise, no accolades, no thoughts that he was extraordinary. He knew his being alive was only due to his wife’s impassioned prayer because if he had not heard that insistent voice, he would have perished, too.
“The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” – James 5:16b
LikeLiked by 5 people
NEW YORK CITY
First Responders
Moira Smith, the only female NYPD officer to die on 9/11….
The Teardrop Memorial, a gift from the Russian people to the American people placed in Jersey City – Names of the dead are inscribed at the base….
THE PENTAGON
UNITED FLIGHT 93
Crew and Passengers
Earliest video of Flight 93 crash on 9/11
AND THE IMPACT ON THE FAMILIES
“Father’s note changes family’s 9/11 account”
http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/Father-s-note-changes-family-s-9-11-account-3850490.php
LikeLiked by 3 people
Looking for a hero at the WTC AND yet another guy who knew the Moslems weren’t done with the WTC and would attack it again?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Rescorla
I’ve posted on Rick before next door, to me he’s just the single most standout person in the whole WTC 911 event.
LikeLiked by 4 people
RIP, Rick:
LikeLiked by 4 people
WeeWeed has a post about it next door.
LikeLiked by 3 people
There’s a few of us who remember Rick. The buzz was and still is about how many were killed when there should be a mention about how many were not killed due to his actions.
LikeLiked by 4 people
And many were destined to be born, because of his actions. A saint, for sure.
LikeLiked by 3 people
And, as the stories go, I can see him leading the scared people down the stars and to safety while singing Men of Harlech to distract them.
LikeLiked by 5 people
Every so often we are privileged wth a reminder that one man or woman can make a tremendous difference. All the difference.
LikeLiked by 5 people
After we have learned about the members of Congress, and those that financially support and own them, and how they lie and pretend to support our nation and represent our citizens while merely doing the biding of lobbiests and special interests….I cannot look at pictures of them standing together pretending to be “unified” even in the time of this horror on 9’/11……I can never trust this group again….especially those that turned around under Obama and sold us down the financial river. Never this bunch….never the special “caucuses” and the division makers of our country.
LikeLiked by 1 person
when will they support tearing down the monument to our lost citizens because it offends some Muslims in NYC? where does the revisionist attact on our HISTORY ever end?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Every mosque in America should be razed.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I understand that to honor the victoms of Moslem perfidy and of hurricane Irma CAIR and their appendage the Moslem Brotherhood have decided to take the day off and not encourage the faithful to kill Kuffar.
April Fool.
LikeLiked by 2 people
The image of Father Mychal being carried in a simple chair, the love honor, heroism, horror, all captured in that single moment is always the first image that comes to mind when I think of 9/11.
Mayor Rudy Giuliani called out, “Father Mike, pray for us!” Mychal responded, “I always do! I always pray for you!”
Words spoken by Father Mychal within his last 30 minutes of life as he was tying to reach firefighters and human beings, his flock were landing and disintegrating around him, “Jesus, please end this right now! God, please end this!”
LikeLiked by 3 people
Love & Tears
LikeLiked by 3 people
Precious is the memory of victim 1.
LikeLiked by 4 people
Keith Schiller on 9/11
He still has a scar from 9/11
When the World Trade Center was attacked on September 11, 2001, Schiller tried to get to the North Tower but didn’t make it before the tower collapsed. Standing next to another building as the tower came down, Schiller realized there was no way to run. The best he could do to protect himself was move to the middle of the street in case his building was next. Schiller put his head down and envisioned a polaroid photograph of his daughter during the ensuing chaos. He emerged unhurt, except for some burns on his back. And after washing the debris off his face, he started helping survivors.
Pray that there is a way that this man can remain at President Trump’s side.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Amen.
LikeLiked by 3 people
May there be great love and joy in Heaven for those who ran INTO the buildings to help.
LikeLiked by 4 people
I have a cousin who was down the street from this in NY – she was OK. I have another cousin who works in the White House – Thank God they never hit hit there – he was OK. I have another cousin who worked at the Pentagon at that time. She had her “miracle baby” in August, and had called me asking my opinion if she should take more time off than what was allowed for maternity leave, or save it for later (vaca time I think). I said she had tried for a long time to have this child, and it was probably the only child she would have, so definitely take an extra week off! She did, and that was when the pentagon was hit. Because of where her office was, she would have died. That child was a gift from God in more ways than one.
LikeLiked by 6 people
In the vein of Divine intervention, the exact area the plane crashed into at the Pentagon had just undergone extensive renovation to harden it against terrorist attack. Had the plane nosed into the rings from above or crashed into any of the other sides the damages would have been far worse.
LikeLiked by 3 people
And of course there’s the #Meatwagon Shuffle from last year……
LikeLiked by 1 person
At this point, Hillary and all her brainwashed hordes believe she’s going to be President…the stumbling into vehicles President…the having to wear special eyeglasses President…the yet-to-be-revealed-illness President…the sicko President…the disgusting beyond all belief President. It was not only a bullet we dodged but a full-on cannon ball of mind disease, desperation, dishonor and destruction.
LikeLiked by 4 people
Thrown in like a side of beef………..
LikeLiked by 2 people
Evenin’ Colonel Sir! Refugees are reporting home as we speak. But it was fun having those little bitty killer jets live with us for a minute! 🙂
LikeLike
There are moments in history when everything changes for civilization. September 11, 2001 was one of those moments.
Our world today is pretty much a result of this terrorist attack. It was the catalyst for the war in Afghanistan which to-date has cost remarkably few coalition lives, precious though they may be–less than 5,000, including civilian contractors but not counting the Afghan forces. Wounded in action is around 20,100 American plus whatever the coalition number is. Stats conflict. The DOD chart is here: https://www.defense.gov/casualty.pdf.
All the war and death in other places since our entry into Afghanistan aren’t directly the result of 9/11, but the rise of violent jihad and ISIS is. Muslims round the world consider this day to be a day of victory for them on their path to desired world domination. America is still the Great Satan.
In tribute…
Medal of Honor Tribute “The War on Terror” (Hymn To The Fallen)
Published on Feb 19, 2013
Let’s also remember the men killed September 11, 2012 (a date that was no coincidence) in Benghazi…Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, Information Officer Sean Smith, and two CIA operatives, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, both former Navy SEALs.
LikeLiked by 3 people
I will always remember……..
LikeLiked by 1 person