in remembrance

If there is to be peace in the world,
There must be peace in the nations.

If there is to be peace in the nations,
There must be peace in the cities.

If there is to be peace in the cities,
There must be peace between neighbors.

If there is to be peace between neighbors,
There must be peace in the home.

If there is to be peace in the home,
There must be peace in the heart.

-- Lao Tzu (570-490 B.C.)

10 years ago, I was woken up by a phone call from a friend.  I was 20 years old.  A senior at Cook College, part of Rutgers University, located in New Brunswick, NJ.  


I answered, still half asleep.  "Can you believe what's going on?" she asked.  I had no clue what she was talking about.  I asked her and she told me to turn on the tv.


"what channel?" I wanted to know.


"doesn't matter" she said. 


And then I knew.  Knew what was happening just 35 miles away.  I watched with so many as the first, and then second tower fell and people ran through the streets of New York.  Sky blackened out and ash and dust hanging in the air.  For days.  Weeks.


Friends made calls to check on loved ones.  One friend's dad worked in one of the towers but had gone out for coffee, or a meeting, or something.... and he made it out alright.  So many stories like that. 


And sadly, so many not.  So many haunting images from that day.


Mike came home (yes, the very same Mike.... aside from a brief few months, we've been together since our freshman year at Rutgers) shortly after I'd received that phone call.  Classes had been cancelled.  And we did what so many others did that day.  We held each other close and watched television for hours, not knowing what else to do besides that and talk to our loved ones.




Ten years is a long time and it isn't.




Today the Asheville Fire Department held a memorial ceremony for the 10 year anniversary and also for their own loss of a captain in the line of duty less than 2 months ago.  Others were recognized for career advances, professional accomplishments, and life-saving acts.  Mike held Claire as I pinned his badge on him in recognition of his promotion over the last year to engineer.

I then watched other wives pin badges onto their husband's uniforms and my heart ached for the widow of the captain recently lost, sitting in the front row, watching.  I remembered watching just weeks ago as the department chief handed her a flag and her deceased husband's helmet.

She was stoic.  Strong.  I think the love and support that surrounds us in those times must be such strong medicine to carry us through such sadness.

Like everyone, everywhere, for all time, we move on.  We make it through, sometimes just barely, sometimes quite gracefully.

It's all we can do.

We honor life by looking at the world around us, feeling deep gratitude for all we have, and deciding to do what we can to make it even more beautiful.