I am going to take a one day break from talking about marriage because of a memory that struck me. You see, as I am writing this, it has been 10 days since the anniversary of 9/11. But, oddly enough, the memory that came to me was not the memory of the towers. It is the memory that most often gets called up, but it was not the memory that came up for me. No, the memory that came up for me was the memory of the fourth plane.
Do you remember the fourth plane? Four planes were hijacked by Al Quaeda. One went into the north tower. One went into the south tower. One went into the Pentagon. And the fourth was due to go into the White House. But, the fourth one never made it. Do you remember about the fourth one?
There is now a memorial called the Flight 93 National Memorial. It is run by the National Park Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior. The permanent memorial is expected to be done by the fall of 2011. On that day in 2001 40 passengers and crew were willing to give up their lives to prevent a tragedy. Their counter attack was not successful and on that day flight 93 plowed into a field in Pennsylvania. But, it did not plow into the White House.
I found myself thinking that we are quick to remember the anger we felt on that day. We remember the Two Towers. Frankly, we tend to forget the Pentagon. And, indeed we should remember the towers and not forget the Pentagon like we tend to. But, here is what we really tend to forget. We tend to forget the selfless sacrifice of forty men and women who probably knew that their choices were to die when they arrived at the target or to choose their place of death. Why do I say that? We have the oral histories of the relatives they called bidding them goodbye and speaking out their love for them. They knew that their chance of death was rather high, but better to die trying to stop the horror than to die having sat without having taken action.
These 40, along with the policemen and firefighters of New York were the heroes of 9/11. Back on 9/11 I published a copy of a simple cartoon that showed the policemen and firefighters of New York City before an American flag. But, today, to my great chagrin and personal regret I realized that no cartoon that I saw 10 days ago remembered the passengers of flight 93.
Why have we forgotten them?
I think we have largely forgotten them because heroism is not highly esteemed today in our "me first," "my rights," entitlement era. Sad to say.
The man looked like he was sleeping. Well dresses clothes, expensive watch, one leg obviously broke, folds underneath his body? Parts of inside his lower body, that only a doctor could tell you what they were, were spread out on the streets of NY, for all to see. What upset, me most about seeing this victim's picture of 911. Was writing under the pictures. "American Humiliation." The other pictures and saying that were on that web's site, I never finished looking at. That what i think of when I thinks of 911. Your right about the plane, that went down in in a farm's field. We don"t make mentions of those heroes enough. Another forgot victims of 911 were those who survived, after they got out of the towers. Guilt they have surviving.
Yep, we forget to thank too many people and to encourage others.
Yep, we forget to thank too many people and to encourage others.