The 10th anniversary of the terrorist attack on America is upon us; people everywhere are thinking about it, certainly the mass media is hitching its valuable airtime to a wagon of endless images and personal stories streaming on nearly every television channel and radio station. And from what I have seen and heard so far, they are doing a good job of keeping it respectful and poignant, and unavoidably very touching.
It certainly is a painful subject though, isn’t it? I mean, after all this time, it still is upsetting to relive those dreadful moments that we all lived through one decade ago. As this recent week wore on, I felt myself becoming quietly anxious, and privately irritable and distracted by the ghost of 9/11. I really do want September 11, 2011 to pass as quickly as possible; yet I never forget.
A month or so ago, Yahoo! sent out an invitation to its contributing writer network, asking for personal accounts of 9/11. More specifically, they wanted to know how the events of 9/11 had changed me, or what it had taught me in its wake. I tentatively accepted the assignment, submitted my offering, and it was just recently published and included into their month-long special feature entitled “9/11 Remembered” (you can find the link on their main browser page through the month of September), under the “Your Stories” category. For every entry that was accepted and published, Yahoo! donated $10 to the 9/11 Memorial Fund, up to a maximum of $10,000, which was a nice additional incentive.
(I have dedicated it with thanks to my friends: firefighters who are on active duty, retired, or no longer with us.)
