9-11; What it is and what it should be: A Rant

I am about to make very many of you angry...but please bare with me. Most Americans would put their thoughts of 9-11 onto a shelf, letting it collect dust until they remember that the eleventh isn't just another day. Then they, usually guiltily, take it down, blowing the cobwebs off in frantic breaths before pining the badge to their shirt, their FaceBook entry, their car window, their office cubicle in the vain hope that they won't seem unpatriotic.I know that I do...I just wish that I wasn't made to feel like a pariah for continuing my life. I have lost friends in the ensuing war, and I have had friends lose family members. I am not untouched by what has happened then or since. I am however, still working, still loving, still selfish at time and yes, sometimes I am not appreciative or grateful for the fact that I am alive and so are most of my loved ones. However, I am enraged by the ways others are trying to profit off the blood, sweat and tears of those America lost.1

9-11 is a disease. It's a fever spread from one person to another through media outlets and right wing nuts who wants us to stand up in arms and fight against injustice. To stake out a little hope and take back our rights, which some of us never lost one and none of us have ever lost the other. It's a plague that descends down upon us on the 10th and is shoved at us until the 12th, making us tear and choke, looking for some way to make the pain go away.2

It's a crutch. It's a useful tool for those who aren't intelligent enough to grab attention in any other way than to wave a torched US flag, dragged through ashes and blood of lost ones in the faces of all the world.They use it to hobble along like a child with a faked twisted ankle looking for sympathy and a free ride.3

It's not more than a gambit, a queen of Spades being passed around the table until we've all taken the hit. People want to use the terror and agony of today to make a political statement, to seize a little lime light in an attempt to "make America what it once was!" To use the pain, loss, and suffering of those who were actually THERE (either in actual body, or those who's hearts were broken in they realized they were never going to see their loved ones again) is a travesty of actual justice.4

I didn't lose anyone directly in of the horror that day. I had no friends or family in the Towers, or on a plane that day and for that I am eternally grateful! I can't imagine the rage and hopelessness people who did lose someone, or even many someones, felt. I know that the terror I felt from just watching it happen was enough to make me sick to my stomach for days. It was during that day, and the many to follow, where we stood- shoulder to shoulder, hands clasped unaware of color, creed, class, caste, ; unaware because at that point we were only Americans- united and proud, beaten but now down, angry and desperate, but also hopeful and brave. It was during that time when I realized what it meant to be proud to be an American. It was during this time when I stopped thinking locally and started trying to live globally.5

But after a few years, that all faded. I will not point fingers at anyone else, I can't speak for you. But I will admit that I, Melissa Marie Kellum, don't wake up every day thinking about the war, about the Towers collapsing, about the many many many people that lost their lives on that day. I can recall my actions and my thoughts when I woke up to the news, and watched the second Tower fall, and I remember being in a church (the first time in years for me) and crying with total strangers as we all prayed for those that were lost. But I don't remember it as vividly as I think I should, I don't recall the exact words that washed over me, or who's hand I was holding while we sat on the pew. And I don't think I am alone in this.6

9-11 was a time when we came together in ways that are unheard before. When we called each other brother and sister, and meant it! When it didn't matter who you were, what you had done, where you lived as long as you were American (and anyone living here at the time IS!) then you were my friend, you were my neighbor, you were my family. And us together, as a family unit, sharing the devastation and anger, facing the night and still holding hands is what it should be about still. Not a campaign point, not a way to score another interview. This was a tragedy felt on a National scale, and the fact we are still recovering from it is not something to sneer at or be ashamed of. But on the opposite side of that coin, it's okay to live on and flourish...those that are gone would love the chance!7

What I am saying it's okay not to remember the exact events....it's just never okay to forget what it cost and what we accomplished!