Looking back on the past few years, I began thinking
of
the day in particular, when war was declared
on each and every citizen of the United States. It is another
one of those days, like the day JFK was killed, that everyone who
was conscious on that day can remember exactly what you were doing
when you first got word. Myself, I was in the middle of a doctors appointment.
This one scheduled by disability to determine my eligibility (actually
to try to counter what my own doctors said so they could turn me down).
They, like many doctor's, had a television in the waiting room. Unlike
most, it was on a channel other than the Cable Health Network. I had
been there since 7:00 AM Ohio time and the drive had taken me over an
hour. I was finally in the middle of an extensive appointment when I
started to hear bits and pieces of something unusual filtering in on the
T.V. audio. Over a period of probably a half hour, I started to develop
a picture of what they were saying. Just about this time, I was pretty
sure I heard them say that a second plane had hit another tower. I realized
instantly that this was an
attack rather than a terrible
accident as it was first reported to be.
I stood up and began to gather my things. I could hear
objections from the people in the room mixing into the background
hum. My mind was focused on what I was hearing and trying to put
together a picture of what I had heard to that point. I walked out
of the examination room without a word and into the waiting area. Much
to my surprise, I don't think the weight of what was unfolding had
soaked in on the majority of those in the waiting room. People at that
time were going on about the business of containing their children,
Etc., and hadn't yet laid down the magazines they were reading. There
was one very thin, balding man, that was locked on to the pictures in
front of him. I stood in the waiting room transfixed on the images that
were being shown of the large plane hitting the tower, then another
plane hitting another tower. I saw a quick flash of a person falling
to their death from somewhere near the top of the tower. As I exited the
office, I turned to see a nurse standing in the exam hallway with her
lips moving and hands placed firmly on both hips. I wondered if she had
been saying something the entire time I was in the waiting room.
On the way home, I heard that another plane had crashed
on the Pentagon. This was a
full on attack. I started to fire
up local emergency frequencies to see if anything was happening close
by. I called home and put everyone on alert and drove by my daughters
school and picked them up. I wanted everyone with me until I learned
the reach and scope of the attack.
I had been over half way home before I realized
that I would not be responding to one of the attack sites. I had
been on an hour long adrenaline pump and was proceeding as I would
if preparing to respond. First assess the situation, insure the safety
of my family and then gather supplies and head for the airport. I was
no longer involved in Law Enforcement. I was no longer an active
Paramedic or Rescue Worker. There would be no "Agency" having my ticket
waiting. My assistance would not be appreciated. I would be "in the way".
My physical condition began to soak back into my mind. With all of the
adrenaline pumping, I had been going through the steps of a well practiced
response and I couldn't even tell that I was disabled. No pain made it
through. It took some time before I actually realized that I had walked
out in the middle of a very important appointment. Part of this appointment
was to assess my mental status. I could just imagine that report.
All I could really do now was what the majority
of us could do, watch T.V. The attack continued to unfold with
yet another plane crashing, this time in a field. I wondered when,
or if it was going to stop. I could also pray. I had been doing this
from the first image that I saw on T.V. I've always had a habit of praying
for others to get out alive, and those that couldn't to be taken quickly.
We later learned of the heroes of this last or forth plane who decided
to take control and instead of sitting back and hoping for the best, decided
to have control over the situation, including their deaths. We will
never know for sure the intended target of that plane. What we do know
is that those brave passengers saved many, many lives. The powers that
be in the media put a stop to the pictures of the people jumping. This
was shown once or twice early on, then not much at all after that.
People jumped, sometimes in pairs, holding hands, to avoid the pain
of fire. They made a conscious decision about how they wanted to
experience
their deaths that day. Unfortunately, many such decisions were made that
day.
Some 2800 human beings were forced to
experience
their deaths as a result that day. This, of course, does not
count the wives and husbands, mothers, fathers and children
who have suffered terribly after the loss of their loved one,
and yes, some have since died. You will never hear about them.
You will also hear very little about those who are suffering so badly
that they wish that death would come to them. Those still living
who were talking to their wives, or husbands when the cellular phone
went suddenly quiet. Those who sat by the phone dialing the number
over and over for 48 hours without rest while they prayed to their
god the the phone would somehow be answered, if even by a nurse at
a hospital saying they are alive. The not knowing, but knowing. Hope
being replaced by disbelief, despair, unbearable pain and eventually
just hope that a body would be found to end the ordeal so you can finally
know just what it is that you have to live with the rest of your life.
We all have to
experience death at some
point. They say that some folks die in their sleep and don't
experience
it at all. Maybe, but I've always found it hard to believe that
there isn't at least a quick moment of realization. Nevertheless,
most of us will
experience death to some degree. Over the past
years, I have seen all of the memorials, the nice clean signs and bumper
stickers, pictures of flowers,
never forget. There is nothing
wrong with the memorials. Some are quite beautiful. All are heartfelt thoughts
and wishes from the creators. I worry, however, that the nice clean manner
in which the memorials are displayed may tend to put a clean face on some
really dirty business.
What I believe that everyone should do is: Sit down in a nice
quiet, comfortable place, and imagine what the death
experience
was like for those who were in those towers, airplanes and the Pentagon.
Most did not die quickly. Most had plenty of time to think, to have hope,
to find stairways. Some, in the second tower, made it to the lobby only
to have officials tell them to return to their desks. They were not in danger
and bodies were falling outside from the air. Then, to start to realize
that things were not good. To go through the various stages to the
point of realization that you may not get out of this. Help may not
come in time. To start to see that this is probably going to be
the last few moments of their lives on this earth. You should try to
imagine the rapid heartbeat as your pulse races, your fingers tingle,
your mind keeps telling you that this can't be happening, not to you!
It happens to those other people, you know, on T.V., on the News, NOT
ME! The urge to use the rest room grows, but there is no time or place.
You think of your husband, your wife, your children, you would give anything
to see your mother right now. You want to cry worse than you ever have in
your life, but nothing happens, no tears. You pick up your cellular phone
and you call your loved one(s). You try to sound as though everything will
be OK. You want to scream, PLEASE, I don't want to die! Again you want
to cry and somehow the person on the phone will make it all go away! But
all you can say is how much you love them, and your children. You try to
leave some instructions without being to obvious in what you are doing. If
possible, you ask to speak to everyone that is on the other end. Try to
imagine what your last words to each person would be. What it would be like
to know that you will never see them again. You know you should hang up
and spare them the
experience of your last moments. You say your
good byes, you will see them soon, and you press "END". Everything has so
much more meaning now. You are numb in the deepest recesses of your being,
yet everything seems so meaningful. Smoke is now filling your lungs. You
can feel intense heat but you don't see any fire. Your skin can feel heat
all around you. Your exits are all blocked. You get down low, so you can
breath better. You realize the heat you are feeling is from the floor! Ouch!
you stand back up. You can smell the rubber burning on your shoes. Toxic
fumes are beginning to rise from carpeted areas. You are getting dizzy. Your
chest hurts, your heart screams. You crouch on your desk as you peer out
the hole that was once a wall. Fresh cool air is swirling just outside.
In the falling debris you realize that there are people falling! You hear
a strange rumble coming from somewhere above. Your chest is so tight you
can barely squeeze out a breath. Thoughts of your wife or husband. Things
are moving. The ceiling is falling! You feel the sensation of falling and
you can feel your body being hit and twisted in all directions but there
is no pain, only terror. How very strange this is. The terror starts to
subside. Cool air hits your face. Calm sweeps over you as things begin
to fade away. Conscious thought slips away to that place just before sleep.
This is it.
Now, after you imagine this (don't use my example,
imagine
yourself in that tower, Pentagon or aircraft),
imagine what your family is going through as you die. Now imagine
what they continue to go through in the days, weeks, months, years
and eternity without you. Who will raise your children? How will your
spouse get by without you to protect them?
Don't let the pretty memorials with bright colors
and pictures of heroes and the american flag start to replace the
horror of the reality of that day. This is dirty, dirty business. It
is filled with terror, horror, death and pain. It lingers and fades
only
so slowly in the hearts of those touched.
Bottom line: Find these bastards. Spend every penny you have
to. Take out loans. Print worthless dollars. Use ALL of the agencies:
FBI, CIA, NSA, anything that either says the word intelligence,
or displays it. Find the bastards and kill them. Not quick. Tuck that
bullshit, better than thou, United States morality in a dim orifice.
Find and torture these freaks of humanity who would kill the innocent
women and children without so much as looking them in the eye. And for
what? To what end? Put a clock on the wall in front of them and tell them
the moment that they will
experience their death, to the second.
Let them know that they will be kept alive at all costs during the torture
between now and then. Make them long for the promised end. When the promised
second arrives, go back on your word. Walk away, close the door behind
you. Let that bastard die slowly, alone, in the dark. Every damn one
of them.
Every election in this country, between the day
that this happened, and the day that every one of these useless
bags of oxygen consuming water are caught and killed, should be
the simplest decision ever made. Whoever is going to do what it
takes to find and extinguish each and every evil soul that had a
hand in this declaration of war against YOU, is the one that you vote
for. I don't care about Democrats and Republicans and all the rest
of that crap. Whoever will get the job done. When you start thinking
that crap like the economy is more important, go sit down with a widow
and let her tell you about that last cell phone call she got from her
husband. Let her 9 year old daughter tell you about her daddy.
We don't need any Jimmy Carters in here, we need a Ronnie
Reagan. Someone that will drop a bomb in your living room if your
mouth gets too big. When you here politicians talking about cutting
back, pulling out, doing it different, Etc., It is time to vote for someone
else. It is time for all of these people who have been sitting back pulling
a paycheck from the U.S. Government, getting the benefits, bragging about
what a soldier you are down at the plant to start earning your pay. This
is what all of that pay and free benefits have been for, this moment.
I get so upset when I see people on TV complaining because a reserve unit
has been called up. What did you think you were signing up for? Just to
pull a paycheck and brag about being a Marine down at the shop? You played
the odds when you signed up. Now it is time to pay back, and pay up. Same
goes for the CIA, FBI, NSA and a few dozen more agencies. Time to get out
from behind that desk and earn your paycheck. The rest of you get up off
your lazy asses and quit running your mouth at the coffee shop and volunteer
somewhere. I just volunteered for
SATERN
(
Salvation
Army
Team
Emergency
Radio
Network). Chances are, if your reading this, you are probably
a Ham. They can use all of us they can get. Get up and do it. Better
yet,
volunteer
for the military.
Yes, all of these words are coming from the mouth of a man
that could put "Reverend" in front of my name, but just like in the
Bible, there is a time to forgive, and by God in heaven, there is a time
for brimstone raining down from the skies! If any of our young pilots
out there are reading this: If you find one of these evil bastards, you
go ahead and rain down some fire and brimstone of your own. You keep that
woman without a husband in your mind, and the fatherless little girl in
your heart. Burn them, son, burn them.... bad.
I would like to "finish" this first installment of my web
page with a memorial to everyone who was involved in 9-11. I'm sure
that there are many times still, when they just
can't cry hard enough.