Where Were You

Someone once said, ~Tragedy carries a tremendous power within it. Power to cause grief, power to cause mourning, power to cause sadness, and power to cause upset. It also carries power to cause closeness, power to cause reflection, and power to cause change. A tragedy can become a positive reference or a negative reference depending on the meaning one attaches to it. the more powerful the tragedy, the more powerful the reference. Understand the tragedy and its potential power to change you for the better.~ For my generation, September 11th, 2001 will and forever be ingrained in our minds as it is compared to the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941, which was an attack that changed all our lives from that moment on.

For the name Osama Bin Ladin will be synonymous with 9/11 and each one of us would gladly beat the living shiznit out of him for it. For a line would form stretching around the world and its probably a line people wouldn't mind waiting hours on end for. However, there is an uncertainty as to whether or not he is alive due to his health as he is/was using a dialysis machine. How hard is it to look for a guy who is 6'6, lanky, sickly, ugly and transporting a dialysis machine wherever he goes? For its truly amazing that a man, who looks like as if Italian actor Roberto Benigni and British actor Rowan Atkinson aka Mr. Bean had a child, can wield/has wielded some major stroke among people that would absolutely die at his word.

Essentially, there have been many questions people have asked, but the main questions is why? Why did it happen and why did it happen to New York? For some, most, or all people believe that America considered itself invincible and nobody could touch us in our backyard, so to speak, but they were wrong. In one split second, everyone's seemingly normal Tuesday morning was turned upside down as each one of us experienced confusion, disbelief, shock, anger, as well as, retribution all in one balled up emotion. So why did it happen to New York and not to California, Illinois, Missouri, Nevada, etc.? In my opinion, New York is considered the hub where every person of every walk of life come to visit and quite possibly make it big.

Without a doubt, the glue that held New York together during its time of crisis just went by one name...Rudy. Despite what he did as mayor before 9/11 was wiped clean and after the senseless tragedy he would be known as the man who stepped up and took control of a perilous situation. He literally became the voice of New York as many New Yorkers looked to him for information and most importantly comforting words, which would hopefully heal in mind, body, and soul. In his very own words that evening Rudy Giuliani said, ~It's going to be a very difficult time. I don't think we yet know the pain we're going to feel. But the thing we have to focus on now is getting the city through this and surviving and being stronger for it. New York is still here.~

In retrospect, it has been 4 years since that tragedy and yet its seems it was only yesterday that it happened. For the many people who valiantly risked their lives, such as the NYPD and NYFD, we will always keep them in our hearts and never forget what they did for those people. For the husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, cousins, friends, and co-workers, they have a piece missing from their heart but eventually they've moved on as best they can. On that day, I was getting ready for class while I watching the Today show and as I turned around that's when the second plane hit the Tower. In the end, I ask this question where you when the world stop turning on that September day and a song that reflects this thoughts is by Alan Jackson entitled Where Were You.