REMEMBERING

     Sad, but true. Fourteen years after the horrific 9/11 terrorist destruction of the Towers and the loss of so many lives there and on the four planes and the Pentagon, there is not one lead story about it on the front page of the NY Times. What one can find is the news about the awful Iran deal that will bite us in our rear soon enough, the glee as they dissect AIPAC, and the news that we are going to accept 10,000 Syrians into the country. Really and truly? This is announced today? Of all days? Is this the day to accept Arab and/or Muslim migrants in extra large numbers? This latest group of migrants are refugees running from ISIS, true, but many are the supporters of Assad who are now fleeing their broken country and who is to say they are all refugees, not moles? We need to be careful here lest we become a bomb torn country before we realize it. I still maintain that the best way to handle this stream of humanity who are leaving their respective countries in droves is to fix the country. Get at the issues at their foundation and encourage these citizens to stand up for their country and not allow others to take it over.
     Do I know if this can ever happen? I hope so, but I do know for sure that we cannot absorb the millions upon millions of migrants from Africa and Asia and the Middle East into the countries of Europe and the Americas. We will be overwhelmed with the absorption  of so many, an impossible task, especially when there is such a cultural difference. Yes, these people need help, but they need help at or in their country and not encouragement to leave their country and the expectations that many are voicing and their indignation when these promises do not materialize. No, they are not going to get houses and jobs and special funds and cars and anything else they can think of. Indeed, are they refugees, economic migrants or people running away from what they themselves have helped bring about?
     9/11 is a time to remember. It is a time to mourn. It is a time to take stock of our present condition. It is a time to cry and a time to vow that we will ever be watchful, not allow this to happen again. But we have lost that watchfulness. We have lost that edge. And that is bad news.
     I cannot and will not forget that day in school, the sudden shock to a day that was beautiful, one that had begun smoothly on our second day of school. Suddenly it was over and the world had changed for all of us. The terror in the eyes of the kids when I explained what had happened. The panic in the eyes of the staff as they took stock, took inventory of family members. I remember me scrolling thru my mind - who was there that we knew and to my horror, we knew too many people, friends and family who were there or in the vicinity. I remember the panic in the eyes of the parents who came to get their children and take them home, the instinctive urge to gather round together, to know where one's loved ones are. I remember my desire to just finally get home and then having to call my son in law for help in guiding me there as the highways were closed and I had to thread my way thru city and county roads to do that.
     I remember the days after, when the streets of Manhattan were papered over with posters, when the air smelled of smoke and indeed there was still smoke rising from the ruins. I remember the pieces of burned papers, of ashes, falling down onto the streets of Brooklyn and the empty place in the sky when we looked at the skyline from Queens. I remember taking my oldest grandson, still a child, into the City to the parks to join in various memorials, to leave our names on posters and murals. I remember not being able to answer his plaintive "why" , why would people do this? Why would they want to? Did they know all these people that they had killed, slaughtered and if not, then why ever do this? A child's questions but no adult answers and indeed, adults were asking themselves the same questions.
     So yes, we need to help remedy this current situation, but not by asking for more trouble, by being careless, by going about it the wrong way. Work IN the countries. Keep sane and realize that reality demands that we do so and if we accept people in, in larger numbers, we MUST vet them carefully for a single loss of a moment's care and investigation can lead to years of horror, blood and death. We do not want that. Not again.
     So, please remember the date - 9/11. Remember those who were so horribly killed, butchered. Remember the brave people who fought and tried to resist on the planes. Remember those first responders and the tragedies that resulted in their deaths. Remember the stories of the heroes inside the Towers who helped lead others to safety or who stayed behind with a friend unable to leave, and died together. Listen to the tapes of the last phone calls to loved ones. Read the book 102 Minutes. Remember. Remember, and do not let this happen again.