nmah5428.xml

nmah5428.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2003-02-05

I woke up that morning and was going to be late for school. When I arrived at about 7:30 Pacific Time. (school starts at 7:45), I was running up the steps of my school's dual story complex and one of my friends caught me and said, "Did you hear about a plane hitting a building in New York?" And I responded, "No." I was in a rush and just figured I'd hear about it later. A few moments later when I got to my English class, a number of people including the teacher were gathered around the television. I asked, "What's going on?" Someone said that a plane had smashed into the WTC and that a second one had hit not long after.

We talked about the event during English. My teacher tried to explain that tragedies happen and that we just have to move on with our lives. It was mostly the same in my other classes. In my Social Studies class we watched the coverage of the event for most of the period.

I immediately went home after school and stayed glued to the television all day long watching various press conferences and other coverage. It was later in the evening, though, with the sun still shining on a clear blue backdrop, when a military fighter jet flew over my house. Actually, my first thought, because the engine of the plane was so loud and I thought that all aircraft were supposed to be grounded, was that another attack was taking place; I soon realized that the fighter was just protecting me and my community. I watched it from my deck gliding gracefully through the sky and it seemed comforting in a peculiar way. I have never been one to call myself a patriot, but it was definitely a relief to know that the US was protecting me; we weren't going to let another tragedy happen again on this day.

I tend to look at the world in terms of one human race instead of nations and different various groups of people. Nations and states divide the world as a whole up and form artificial barriers that make it all the more difficult for the peoples of those nations to come to any type of understanding with each other. Eventually I believe that it will be in the best interests of the world to form a world government that looks to the future to advance our species in the next frontier.

I believe that a great crisis looms ahead. As a country, America has the historical precedent to be reactive, not proactive, to our economic status and other self-interests when dealing with civil problems; we didn't free slaves because it was morally right, we did it because it was no longer profitable. The same problem exists today. We aren't going to go in to liberate the people of Iraq because they have an oppressive dictator controlling the nation and killing its own citizens; we will go in because our government at any cost wants to keep its oil interests safe in the Middle East.

We are now fighting this war; A new kind of war. A war on Terror. A war without a specific enemy, that is not located within any specific border. Terrorism is an idea; how do you fight an idea? As a people we need to be constantly paying attention to the government's policy as it deals with people that fit the "profile" of terrorists. In World War II, our government detained thousands of American citizens of Japanese decent into internment camps; now we issue apologies to the survivors and their families. But we must ask ourselves, haven't we learned our lesson? After September 11th, most of the population of New York supported placing all the middle-eastern men of the state into internment camps. Many Americans have been held indefinitely without being charged. How far have we really come?

We must remember and honor the sacrifices of all of the men and women who were going about their business and just trying to make a living in the trade center and the pentagon. We must remember the firefighters we bravely went into the WTC to rescue people and fight the fire on the top floors of the building and who ultimately lost their lives. We must remember the brave sacrifices of the passengers aboard the plane that could have hit another American landmark but didn't because they took back control of the plane, which crashed into an empty field. We must remember that on September 11th our country was snapped out of its isolation and complacency and it realized that the world is a dangerous place.

I flew an American flag next to our door at our house on the night of September 11th. It remained for a few months until it was no longer presentable. To this day I choose to fly two American flags in my room; one in the window and on my room wall. It is important to recognize that I do live in the United States and that I am a citizen of a great nation and that I am very fortunate to live here.