Saturday, September 11, 2010

Godspeed

My aviation-obsessed son David has his very first airplane ride today, courtesy of the Civil Air Patrol.  He's over-the-moon excited;  and I will watch with joy (and perhaps just a touch of trepidation) as my son soars up into those blue skies tomorrow - skies that 9 years ago seemed to reverberate with pain, skies whose deafening silence bore testimony to the tragic events of that day.

Perhaps it is fitting that my son on this very day flies joyfully into the wild blue yonder.  As each day passes, this world belongs more and more to our children and to their future - a future, eventually, without me and all the other adults who watched the towers fall.  I'm thinking that maybe - just maybe - that could be a good thing.

We honor the dead by remembering, of course.  I will always remember.  But we also honor the victims of 9/11 by refusing to perpetuate the sort of ignorance and hate which killed almost 3000 people 9 years ago today.  And by teaching our children to do the same.

Let them fly.

7 comments:

  1. Lovely. Thank you, and good luck David!

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  2. Amen to that!!!! How exciting and scary to have a son flying:)

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  3. So very well said, SC!
    Today is my son's birthday. I hope that someday I can say that without someone saying, "Oh, I'm sorry!"

    Fly high, David!

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  4. I was thinking today how great it would be if instead of fighting against a Muslim center blocks away from ground zero we would build a big ol' mosque right on it.

    That's the kind of American I wish we all were.

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  5. Thank you. Godspeed, David.

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  6. "But we also honor the victims of 9/11 by refusing to perpetuate the sort of ignorance and hate which killed almost 3000 people 9 years ago today."

    This is the key.

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