Few things bring tears to my eyes these days. This date is one of them. After 23 years, the memories are still so clear, and so painful . . .

The view of the smoke rising from the Pentagon directly across the Potomac River from my office.

Being unable to get a phone line to reach family members so they’d know I was all right.

Traffic jams, but no one honking their horns impatiently, everyone yielding to everyone else.

My Middle Eastern neighbors taking refuge in their apartments, afraid and ashamed to show their faces.

The endless replays on TV of the buildings collapsing in New York . . . the running people . . . the falling man.

My three-year-old grandson running to me, calling out, “Nana! Nana! Some bad guys blowed up a building!”

And for a while afterward, the sense of patriotism, of togetherness, and the determination that it would never happen again.

For a while . . .

And after two-plus decades, knowing that the world had learned nothing.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
9/11/24