Tear of Grief - Wordless Wednesday

Ten Years

This was taken Labor Dady Weekend 2001... our first visit to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island... days before the attack. This was taken on the ferry between the two by my dad.

I know a lot of people have written many things about 9/11 already. I even wrote about what I experienced on 9/11 on this day last year. But I have something different to share this year too.

In my acting school, on September 12, 2001, when we came back to school, our teacher had us write a note to ourselves in the future. He promised us to mail them to us ten years from now. After experiencing the tragedies of the last twenty four hours the mere idea of comprehending ten years into the future seemed impossible. I remember sitting on the studio floor, struggling with what to write.

A few weeks ago I remembered that we wrote these letters. I wrote to my teacher Joe on Facebook asking if he still had them, and he did. On Thursday the letter arrived to my address here in Virginia. This morning I opened it and took my time to read it as I watched memorial coverage in the background. I was fourteen when I wrote this letter and had just experienced one of the biggest horrors imaginable. My handwriting is different, it is when I did the circles over my eyes and curled the bottoms of my gs and js. Joe included his own letter to us.... not to judge ourselves or what we wrote. We are to use this as a vehicle to recall the person who sat on the floor of the dance studio and tried to figure out what was happening.

I debated sharing it here, but I will. I think it is important to remember, and I know having such a direct link in my hands is something most people do not have. So, no judging, here it goes.

Hi,

I am sitting here in Joe and Shelias class for drama writing you a letter. Do you remember yesterday? Yesterday was the attack on America. I don't understand why this happened. Why did thousands of poeple have to die? Why were those planes hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon and World Trade Centers? Do you remember sitting in Mrs. Pacilios Spanish 2 class and hearing Dan K**** tell you what you and Jay heard on the radio was true?

On the bus from Vo-tech Jay, Meghan C and I heard a plane crashed into the twin towers, or one of them. Do you remember thinking the pilot just couldn't fly? Hijacking never entered our minds. Then in Spanish, actually hearing the principal come on the loud speaker and telling you this, and to feel free to call relatives from the guidance office.

Do you remember missing part of Algebra to call Mom and Dad to see if Greg, Rob, Ken, Uncle Bob, Joni, and eventually remembering George... were ok? They were. George ended up being off, and you call him before lunch with no answer and lecture him for forgetting your birthday but to be ok.

I'll never understand why this was done. Ever. Or how it was fully done. These sick people may cause a World War III, but they haven't broken us. They made us stronger. Don't ever forget that.

And don't forget the discussion we just had in Vo-tech. You, Jay, Melissa, Megan... everyone. Speak your mind.

Love always,

Allison O Age 14 -> You!


Wow.

I forgot I called George... my biological father. He worked in the Lincoln Tunnel. This was the first birthday of many of mine he had forgotten but I didn't care, I wanted to make sure he was ok. He didn't go into work that day. I don't remember that. Or the convesation I wrote about at the end.

This event caused my husband, then a 13 year old 8th grader, to want to join the Marine Corps. He decided on THAT day then and there.... this altered our futures and made our lives into what they are today. I will remember all those who were lost in Washington DC, New York City, Shanksville PA, Iraq and Afghanistan. We will never forget.

Remembering the Fallen

Originally I wanted to write about my weekend, but I think that will wait until tomorrow.

I was sitting in the car Saturday morning when the CNN Breaking News story came on the radio. My heart sank when I heard the story of the helicopter crash and loss of 38 lives. 20 Americans out there fighting for our freedom as well as eight others... Afghan Soldiers, a Dog handler and more... gone. It choked me up and made my throat painfully tight as I imagined 30 American families getting a knock at the door. The worst nightmare of any spouse or parent. As American Soldier came on the radio following the news update I almost cried in the car.

Coming in to work this morning and talking with all the clients of ours who are military veterans was sombering. Seeing the report on CNN interviewing their families, reading this news article... the biggest single loss of American life in one day since the war began a decade ago.


God Bless these brave men and their families.

And thank you.

"The nation which forgets its defenders will be itself forgotten."
- Calvin Coolidge

Praying Mantis

My New Years update will wait until we can get my pictures onto a computer somewhere, so in the mean time, let's go back a week or so...


Ryan and I tend to have moments like this. Remember how our first married vacation that turned into one of THOSE vacations? Well our first Christmas may be the same!! Luckily this did not happen on Christmas, but it will revolve around our first tree and will always be remembered as part of our first Christmas.

We argued a bit about how long to leave the tree up. In my family we always left it up until the Feast of the Epiphany, or January 6th. Ryan's thought it was bad luckto leave it up past New Years. I was winning out, we went up to NJ for Christmas and were about to do the same for New Years. Getting all the ornaments away was going to take a lot of time so it looked like it was going to stay up til we got back from new Jersey. On Wednesday night, December 29th, we were in the living room and I glanced up at ceiling and saw something up there.


sorry not my picture

What is it you ask? A baby praying mantis. Now I always heard you were not supposed to kill them. As a kid you were told it was against the law in Jersey even! Not sure if that is true.... *googles* Ok it's not. Anyway....

We caught the first one and set it outside like nice karma abiding people. Or whatever. We get back in and notice another one. And another. And two more over there. Ryan suggests they may have been coming from our Christmas tree. We look by the tree and five more are on the wall. Ugh. Bugs don't bother me usually, but this was kind of grossing me out. So I set my husband on getting all of them and told him since he was off tomorrow and I had to work he could take down the tree if he wanted to. That way he gets his way and it is down before New Years. I even said if he just gently took all the ornaments off the tree I'd put them away when I got home.

Deal.

The next day I am at work and it is D.E.A.D. I am googling and reading blogs and playing words with friends or scrabble on my itouch when I hear from Ryan. Apparently he went to take off the ornaments and when he looked inside the tree it was swarming with hundreds of baby praying mantises manti mantises! He looked up at the star and saw even more of them congregating.

ACK!

So my calm husband (thank god I was at work) quickly removes all the ornaments except for the lights and the silver strand of ball things we had on the tree. He then dragged it stand and all to the front door, quickly undid the stand, and ran out of the apartment and outside and threw our tree down in the bushes. He then shook all the praying mantises off him and whipped off his jacket and started beating it against the railing.

ACKx2!

He then carefully stands up the tree and begins to spin off the lights and other stringed decorations. Bugs were aflyin! He then dragged the tree to the dumpster and headed over to the leasing office. They got the exterminator to come and respray out baseboards (free of charge!).

The exterminator was shocked though.

E: Why would you want to kill praying mantises? They eat other bugs!
Ryan: Yes but we had hundreds of them in our apartment.
E: Yea well they eat each other anyway. If you left for a week you'd only have one big one left!
Ryan: That's nice, but we still want to make sure none get out and into other apartments.
E: I sometimes will catch them and put them in my garden even.
Ryan: Yes, but you don't put them in your living room. Please spray.

Oy.

I am not going to lie, when Ryan told me the story I was laughing. Very grateful I was not home, but laughing. I can just imagine my big strong Marine jumping up and down to shake off the little things and frantically beating his jacket and it made me laugh. When I got home I put all the ornaments away and we still found about five more.

But we got in the car and drove to Jersey regardless. Me shuddering randomly every now and then when I thought about it.

When we got home Sunday night we found one dead one hanging out on the ceiling and Ryan said there was one in the bathroom... but no sightings since then. We suspect our Christmas tree had eggs on it and our apartment is quite warm so they thought Hey it's spring! Let's hatch! I told Ryan next year, we are getting a fake tree. He told me we're just going to go somewhere next year that sprays their trees.

Let's see what happens eh?

*shudder*

Bllllaagh

Not much to say. I put all my creative-ness for blogging today into a guest post and now don't really have anything I want to say!

Ryan got home around 2am since he and Josh had one last night to hang (yea he officially moved today). But I was angry at the hubby for a certain reason that shall be named and we have had clipped exchanges today. I have physical therapy tonight so I am just chilling at work after hours and he has an event til 9 anyway... plus breaking it down after. So who knows.

I was productive yesterday though and got the winter comforter on our bed (AND the bed skirt. You know how hard that is to do alone??), watered the tree, vacuumed needles, then went through all the "boxes" in the dining room. We get care packages from my mom a lot and I had some blog boxes from swaps still sitting around. Most of the stuff was put away and other things accuulated, like old mail and fliers and things that just conveniently fit in the boxes. Well, all gone now. I then snuggled into my snuggie, yes I own one and love it, and watched the Next Great Baker on TLC because I loves me some Cake Boss.

I also tried to call and see if I could schedule a surgery today... no dice. Left a voicemail. This whole process is getting SO old.




RIP to all those who gave their lives on this day in 1941 at Pearl Harbor. It made me a little sad to sign on to AOL and Yahoo and glance at CNN and no one even mention it. I don't expect it to take over the news, but it should be at least there. But I will mention it. Thank you.

Also RIP Elizabeth Edwards, I just saw on CNN she passed away. I hope her children will find comfort in her peace.

Remember

I was 14 years and three days old. It was my second week of my freshman year of highschool.

I remember being on the bus between my two schools (my acting school and academic school) and hearing it on the radio. The first plane hitting. I remember a picture in my mind of a small plane (not an airline plane) nicking the tall atenna on the top of the one Tower. I remember being in Spanish class when the announcement was made on the loudspeaker. The full story.

I remember my history class being glued to the TV. The footage showed over and over again. I remember wondering if my family in the City, a mere 45 minutes away, were ok. I remember feeling panicked, scared and horribly sad.

I remember the the pink slips of paper coming into class. Kids were being picked up left and right to go home. White slips were phone calls. Everytime either one came in the whole room held its breath. I remember my English teacher desperately trying to reach his wife who worked a few blocks away from the Towers. I remember being allowed to use our cellphones to call home. I remember my mom saying no one heard from Uncle Bob yet (my mom's uncle) who typically took the PATH train to the World Trade Center and walked to work. I remember the relief when he stumbled home that night and the phone chain went out. He heard on the train police activity was blocking the tunnel so he went back to Penn Station in time to hit the flood of people fleeing the city.

I remember his son-in-law, a police officer, going to Ground Zero and not coming home for three days and never speaking again of what he saw there.

I remember the questions in my four year old brother's eyes. How do you explain something like that to someone so small?

I remember the church services and memorials.

I remember being asked to speak (as a student speaker and representing my acting school) at the county memorial. I remember speaking in front of 3,000 people holding candles trying to keep it together.

I remember the dead air space over NJ. I remember being in my acting class and writing a letter to myself ten years in the future...next year. During that scary silence three fighter jets flew over our school shaking the entire building, peolpe jumped and screamed. Then being at tennis practice a few days later when the first regular plane flew over again. Everyone stopped and watched it go from one end of the sky to the other in silence.

I can remember September 11, 2001 with such startling clarity. I doubt it is something that I will ever be able to lose the details of. I remember someone saying for older generations everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when Kennedy was shot. This is the one for our generation. Instead of one great man losing his life over 3,000 innocent people perished.

Who would have thought this event would trigger my then thirteen year old husband living a thousand miles away to want to join the Marines from preventing something like this from ever happening again? This one event altered all of our lives. It created a different future. It changed everything.

Prayers, love, and thoughts. To all those who died, to those who lost loved ones, and to all those still effected to this day.

I Remember.