|
|
|
September 11th, 2010
11:03 pm - 9/11 in memorium
In rememberance to those who died on 9/11/2001.
***********************
As I sit here staring at my computer screen trying to tie all that I feel into words, I find that they don't exist. Nothing can express what I'm feeling right now. The pain and loss, anger and sadness, fear and regrett all tied to the actions of a handful and the deaths of thousands.
I've listened to the opinions, the rhetoric, and the media. I watched the planes hit and the towers fall the first time and then repeated and repeated and repeated. I can hear the cries of the people in the buildings and feel the knowledge that I will die. The desire to hear my wife and children's voices one last time. To let them know that I love them. Then I'm there in the living room with them again.
I hear a plane flying high and look up in time to see a small dot coming down in the air. Then a flash and heat and people screaming around me. I see children flying past me already dead in the air. The chared bodies and broken lives. This is our Hiroshima.
I drive to work under the watchful eyes of gunships patroling the air. I sleep in the sounds of the aircraft going to the city. I hear the rally calls on the streets and the air. Watch them on TV. And I realize that I too lost much in what happened.
KMart stops selling guns and ammunition in the wake in fear of contributing to the backlash. People at work call them anti-american and say they should be handing it out for free so we can get rid of 'The Turban Heads."
I hear the rally cry "Remember September 11, 2001!" I feel the ground shake with the echos. I help collect the boxes of food. I watch my 4 year old daughter cry for the people who died. I see my son rapt with the explosion on the news and think "He's not even 2!" I read the papers and nothing makes sense.
I get stopped by a neighbor asking me to bring his donations in for him, for he's too scared to be seen outside his house. I notice the scrawlings of hate on his house and give him my prayers. He came here to flee the persecutions of his home and now meets them in his refuge.
I do not know what it means to be an American. I know what it is to live here but I guess I don't know what it is to be an 'American'. I was informed of this fact by the recruiter who stood on my front porch for an hour trying to convince me to 'up'. For now to be American I have to pick up a gun and kill. I have to hate enough to put aside my compassion and understanding and pull a trigger at someone I've never met.
A man who not long ago may not have known anything more than I did about the tragedy about to fall in the US. A man who has been called to defend his country from the imposing might of a nation using the battle cry of the civil rights movement. "United we Stand, Divided we Fall" Yes, united we are. But more and more I fear that we are united with a hatred and anger I cannot feel. So for now, I no longer can feel like an American. I cannot wave the flag and say 'Kill Arabs'. I cannot deface my neighbor's house or threated to bomb where he worships. 'Allah' did not make this handful of people kill. The man who claimed to know 'Allah' did. Their existance, their lives...
Such that I cannot understand in this lap of luxery.
The land of Opportunity. The 'Great Melting Pot'.
I will not turn my back on the Lady who stood silent and alone watching the Towers fall. I will cry the tears that she cannot and feel the sorrow she will not show. Steadfast and true is the Lady of Liberty who still says, "Bring me your poor, your weak, your hungry, your masses" bring them to me for comfort at this time of pain and suffering. That I can do, that I can feel. Since that's no longer what it means to be patriotic and an American. I will just be content that I can live here and be a stranger in a strange land.
Maybe some day I will learn what it means to be an American. But for now I will pray to whatever Gods and Goddesses that exist to stay ignorant for my childrens' sake.
|
October 7th, 2006
03:18 am
For those who still watch this journal and haven't heard. I am now working at GE's R&D plant in Niskayuna, NY. It's the first day shift I've worked in 7 years. It's a big but good change to my life. I'm feeling more and more like the man I used to be. Okay, with 4 kids now, but still. I'm feeling my sense of humor coming back. I'm more patient than I had gotten. I'm more resiliant.
I'm just better.
*hugs*
|
December 17th, 2005
03:18 pm
30 years ago today...  rhysabs_wench came into this world. No matter what anyone says or what I have said. She is still the best thing that has happened to me in this life.
Happy Birthday dear, I still love you.
|
November 30th, 2005
10:29 pm - Baby
For those who missed it. Katrina Marie Long was born on November 23 at 3:01 am. 7 pounds 7 onzes... Cutest baby of the bunch. She's a sweetie who won her daddy's heart already.
|
August 29th, 2005
07:46 pm - Update on Grandma
For those who were wondering...
They just found out what has been wrong with my grandmother.
The internal bleeding has been traced back to large masses of Breast Cancer... It's in stage IV at this point.
http://www.breastcancer.org/tre_opts_table_4.html
The doctors aren't even trying to kid anyone on her chances this time.
But now we know. Now we know.
|
August 20th, 2005
05:33 pm
This is what I'm doing today... I so wish I could go hug my kids tonight.
http://www.nysamber.troopers.state.ny.us/view.cfm?ID=9
|
July 19th, 2005
12:23 pm - Update on Grandma
Grandma is going to be in the hospital for at least a few more days. The cumatin has NOT stabalized her heart like it is supposed to. There's still fluid building around her lungs and heart they can't account for. And since she isn't stable enough to do the tests needed to find out what needs to be fixed.
This is just not good. If she continues the way she's going, I'm not going to want to bring the kids in to see her again. They don't need those kinds of nightmares right now.
|
July 18th, 2005
04:00 pm
Day 11 of the Grandma watch and no new news.
|
July 17th, 2005
09:39 pm
No updates on Grandma today. None at all.
|
July 15th, 2005
10:13 pm
Tests for my grandmother have been put off until Monday. Her heart is not stable enough to run the tests yet and they are hoping to get them run on Monday now. She's holding on... but not well.
|
|
|
|
|
|
LiveJournal.com |
