Nine Years

It was just another work day when I got out of bed, a beautiful morning, really, and I wished I could go to the beach. I got my shower, my coffee, and the remote control, and decided to catch the news before I had to leave for work. What the hell was happening? That was the Twin Towers, and one of them was on fire! Someone was being interviewed, and I watched as a plane smashed into the World Trade Center again. Troy, my roommate, came into the room then, and he said, "what kind of movie are you watching?" My eyes still glued to the television, I answered, " That's New York...it's happening right now. I think we're at war." Good God! What should we do? What could we do? That was nine years ago...I still ask myself those questions sometimes.

The war still rages on. At least with Pearl Harbor, we knew what to do. The enemy had a uniform, a national identity, and even when they were cruel, they at least had a code of conduct. My grandparents were prisoners of war at a Japanese camp in the Philippines, and they came to know the enemy well. Today's enemy has no face, flies no flag, and takes no prisoners. The kamikaze plane that smashed into a destroyer was clearly marked, but the enemy pilots in this war fly passenger planes, full of innocents, anywhere they think they can kill the most people. How do we fight the enemy if they are just busboys, lawyers, or salesmen right up until the second they attack with a bomb strapped to their chests?

So the debate over civil liberties began. We have had to balance our need to protect our selves and our thirst for justice with the responsibility of the civil society and the duty to be fair. We can't profile people based on their race or religion, we don't want to betray the high ideals of this nation. After all, not all Arabs or Muslims are terrorists...and yet, all of the conspirators of 9/11 were both. There are plenty of patriotic, peace-loving, American Muslims...some of them are even in our armed forces, fighting and dying this very moment...but the next moment, someone like Major Nadal Malik Hasan at Fort Hood, Texas, will attack his fellow American soldiers, shouting, "Allahu Akbar!" Benjamin Franklin said, "Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." I believe that, too. So I still ask, what can we do?

Yes, this is a day of remembrance, a day to pay tribute to all of the people who died that day, to honor our police and firefighters, to give thanks for the men and women who protect us still. Today may be this generation's "Pearl Harbor Day," but we have yet to have our "VJ Day." I wonder if we ever will have a day when the parades roll down Main Street, when we celebrate our victory with streamers and the like, a "Victory Over Terror Day." The purpose of war, I have heard someone say, is to kill people and break things until the enemy are dead or they give up. It's ugly, but it's the only way to win. The problem is, we can't even agree who the enemy is. Some Americans will even tell you that we are the bad guys, that we deserved it, that we still do. So we are at war with ourselves, too.
The first anniversary of 9/11 was a heavy day for me. There was a singer, I think it was Suzanne Vega, who sang a song on a talk show that day. She sang, "It hit home...it still does..." I cried. Now on September 11th, 2010, there are no tears, but there has been little healing, either. Never Forget, the radio talk show hosts say. Well, who can forget? How do you forget that you are at war? Maybe one day, jaded Americans will use this day as a holiday, a day to grill hot dogs and complain that the Post Office is closed, maybe one day if the war ever does end. Today is Saturday. A pretty summer day in Oklahoma. I woke up late, had some coffee, and watched cartoons with my children. Nothing blew up, no one died, at least that I know of, and I guess I have a whole lot of people wearing uniforms to thank for that. But I still hear that song, and I still ask myself, "what can we do? What should we do?"