Encouragement
Hope and Heroes
It's strange, seeing those images again. The planes. The fires. The people. I find myself leaving the room from time to time as my eyes well up, watching the pictures on the screen with little more comprehension than I had five years ago. In the home video captured by a local cameraman we follow the progress of Engine 7, a group of firefighters struggling to redeem lives out of the chaos. We hear the bodies crashing outside the tower as people leap to their death. We see the metal bent in agonizing angles. Steel girders twisted and folded like cheap plastic. Cars lying two or three high, piled and crushed on top of one another. And everywhere is the dust, the dust that covers the streets like snow on a battlefield.
But it's the humanity, the empty faced men and women stumbling through the wreckage, their bodies covered in blood and dirt that brings me back to that day. And as I watch the screen I become aware of my life now. Much has changed since that day five years ago, and in a way, it feels like another life.
When I was a kid, I remember my dad telling me about the day JFK was shot. Growing up in a Catholic home, the mere mention of JFK would bring tears to his eyes if we talked about it for any length of time.
"We all remember, Stevie. We all remember who we were with, what we were doing. You don't forget those days, son."
That morning five years ago I remember sitting in the two bedroom apartment I shared with my wife. I remember watching with horror as the second plane flew into the building. I remember holding her tight as we cried together. And for the next weeks, thinking about what it meant, trying to comprehend all that we'd seen, to somehow bring order to the disorder. The faces on the screen, etched with sorrow and disbelief, was similar to the face now staring back at me in the mirror each morning. And with all of us, one question seemed unavoidable.
Why God?
Over the past five years intellectuals and politicians have offered their pedantic and guilt ridden explanations. Our wealth. Foreign policy. Oil. Conspiracy. Greed. They offer these words, hate filled though they may be, because they wish for the illusion of control. They have used these words to help us try and fill the empty spaces in our minds, if not our hearts. But as I stare at the screen in my apartment five years later, their words seem as vapid and empty as the dust filled streets that morning.
The show ends, and I move to the balcony. The stars are bright tonight, and the air is cold. It will soon be winter here. As much as 9/11 brings me back to that day, it takes me to another life. To a time when I was married, hopeful about our future. These days, I live alone. The two events aren't related, but in some ways I can't seem to separate the loss on 9/11 with the losses in my own life. Is it because tragedy has its own unifying elements? Is it because our hearts and our souls stir most in the shadow of the valley? I'm not sure.
I run my hand along the wooden balcony, and frown at the Christmas lights I still haven't taken down. I do not know what it would be like to be one of those firemen, to listen to the sound of people jumping to their death. To spend twenty four hours searching and tearing and groping through the broken and shattered building for signs of life, only to find the occasional body part, the occasional body. I don't know if I would ever be the same, because in so many ways, none of us are.
The sound of a neighbor's radio carries softly in the night air. But as much as September 11th draws me back, I find it pulling me forward tonight. I feel my world getting bigger somehow. I begin to think about the people in the apartment next me. In my building. At my school. At the coffee shop. I think about how often I let my life revolve around the wrong things. Around my impatience. Around my budget. Around me. Hundreds of firefighters died that day. They died thinking about the lives around them.
We don't celebrate heroes a whole lot anymore, not the real kind. We celebrate pop stars and rich divas. We celebrate jocks and entertainers and comedians. But September 11th reminds me that occasionally we get it right. That occasionally we find what truly inspires the human spirit.
I look up at the stars and breathe the air in one last time before bed. As much as I am reminded of what was, of what my life used to be, I am determined that this September 11th will not be about the past. It will be about the future. About the heroes of that tragic day five years ago, and the heroes in my own life. My parents. My family. My teachers and coaches and pastors and mentors and friends and all those who stepped outside themselves to help me navigate this broken planet.
We've all made choices that we regret, and sometimes it's difficult to move past them. Sometimes we let those memories entangle us until slowly our lives are nothing more than an endless cycle of trying to make our own lives better. And in our search for the Well of Happiness we forget where real joy resides. Not in us, but in the betterment of all those God has placed in our daily circle.
I turn the television off and stare at the blank screen before heading to my room. I still don't know the answer to the question. But for the rest of my life I will remember that day. I will tell my kids one day about what it means to be a hero. I will tell them that no matter what our politicians and commentators and intellectuals and journalists tell us, no matter what words they use, the acts of selflessness we saw that day speak in a much louder voice.
And while I will never forget that day, my prayer is that those memories will be a continual reminder of what really matters, both now and in the future, of the difference we can make in this world.
-Steve
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Steve, Thank you for sharing this inspiring piece with us. It brings to the forefront the things that really matters that we so often neglect. Hope that all who reads will be inspired to reach out to others, knowing where their joy comes from. Continue to inspire others with the words you receive. Blessings. Janice
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