Memory Monday: Never Forgetting...

I awoke that morning, sleep deprived as usual.  Our baby was hungry and ready to eat.  It was a little later than I had planned considering I had to go into work to train my replacement at the Co-Op where I taught.  I was slow and a bit bleary eyed.  Taking my time, I fed my baby, got dressed and prepared for my day.

The phone rang.  It was my boss.  He told me not to come in.  I was a bit confused until he told me to turn my television on.  He stayed on with me for a moment while I did.  As I expressed a desperate need to contact my family, he repeated his original suggestion.  Stay home, call your family.  They were all over the world but none of them anywhere near New York.  That didn't lessen my desperation to hear their voices.

At first, I couldn't talk to my parents.  They were in Japan with my baby brothers.  Hearing my grandmother's voice, who lived a half an hour away, gave me a center.  I carried on with my desperate mission.  One by one, I spoke with my brothers, my sister-in-law and finally my parents...all while watching the chaos unfolding. 

At some point during the morning of September 11th it dawned on me:  At the very least, my little brother would be going to war.  At the most, my husband who'd always expressed a desire to serve in the military would be joining him.  I didn't know what any of it meant at the time but it seemed pretty obvious.  For a time I was angry, furious that I couldn't have been with my family.  I felt alone, scared and heartbroken that the baby we just brought into this world would be raised in a vastly different place than I had and I couldn't even connect with my family.

Remembering my sister-in-law a few doors down didn't have a t.v., I knew she needed to know what was happening.  I invited her to our basement apartment.  We watched together, mostly in silence.  It had been a really hard year for us.  We'd grown up being good friends.  I loved her from the moment I met her.  But in the recent years we married brothers, had babies and for some reason, as I became a member of the family, I became closed off, resentful and territorial toward her and several others of my husband's clan.  I had damaged our friendship and sisterhood and felt a bit alien from most of them in general.  

Looking back at that day, watching New York and the rest of humanity suffer devastating loss, those hurts and resentments didn't seem to matter as much.  My complaints seemed trite and self centered.  There were families who treasured each other ripped apart that day; lives ended, goodbyes never uttered.  Yet I wasted so much precious time squandering opportunities to know my new brothers and sisters. 

I suspect there were a lot of others out there like me:  indirectly affected yet nonetheless devastated.  I wonder if they, too, had a family around them they refused to see.  Had they fallen into that dangerous rut people sometimes fall into after a couple of years of marriage?  Did they have a spouse they didn't appreciate as much as they could have because they, themselves, were too self-absorbed?



It was devastating to know that there was VERY little I could do for the people directly affected by the terrorist attacks.  All I could do was pray for them. 

And then there was another epiphany. 

There were others who needed help and comfort.  Assistance would be subtle, on a much smaller scale but nevertheless needed. It was that day that I began to open my eyes to see the family I refused to see for way to long.  They were hurting from the events of that day and needed comfort too.  They needed the kind of support I could give. And I had a responsibility to give it. 


That day confirmed what I already thought I knew.  Life is precious and beautiful.  Others, especially our family, are always in need of our prayers and service.  With a heart full of love for others we can heal the wounds of hatred and malice.  That is a lesson I don't plan on ever forgetting.