Five Years

I imagine a lot of bloggers will have posts today remembering where they were and what they experienced five years ago today, and I'm not ashamed to be among them. Three may be the magic number for clovers and movies, but anniversaries seem always to be honored most on the fives.

When I was young, just about everytime the subject of JFK was brought up, my elders would discuss where they were that day. They could always remember it with a clarity unmatched by any other experience in their lives. I was mystified by this until the Challenger disaster. I remember to this day my father coming home and telling me about it (we didn't get to watch the launch on TV at school as so many other kids apparently did). I came to think of that day as my generation's JFK moment, if you will.

But then, five years ago today, the tragedy of the shuttle was eclipsed by the terrorist attack. I still remember the day of the shuttle explosion well, but 9/11 is the most serious, best-remembered news happening in my life.

That day marked six months to the day since my son had been born. I was on parental leave from work, at home taking care of the boy. At that time, my routine was based around his routine: I would wake early in the morning to feed and change him, would go back to sleep when he did, would wake again when he got hungry. Lazy days spent napping, feeding, changing, and burping. That day would be drastically different.

Jen called me early in the morning and woke me - it must have been about 7am. She heard on the radio on the way to work that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. This would have been just about an hour after it actually happened, details out here on the West Coast were still sketchy. I asked her what kind of plane, if it was an accident or an attack or what; she didn't know. She was just getting to work.

At the time, we had a TV but it was just for watching movies. We had no cable, not even rabbit ears, no TV reception at all. I immediately got online to find out what was happening. Many of the major news sites were down, their server load crushed by the number of people trying to hit them. I got most of the news that day from Slashdot and similar sources. Slowly, the truth began to unfold: two planes, one into each tower of the WTC, one into the Pentagon, another downed by passengers on the plane who fought hijackers.

Despite exhaustion from waking several times in the night to feed the baby, I stayed awake all day, refreshing pages, hitting new sites, and messaging friends. More facts came out, the death toll estimates rose and rose. I only left the computer to feed the boy or take care of other biological necessities.

I worried what the reaction in the U.S. would be like. I was concerned about a backlash against Muslims in this country, worried about violence toward innocent Muslims. My then brother-in-law is Muslim, has dark skin, but he's no terrorist. I worried that the Bush administration, whom I had already come to distrust, would use the attacks as an excuse to take away rights from the people and enforce more draconian laws.

I worried this would just be the start of a new wave of terrorist attacks in the U.S. and I worried about what kind of world I had just brought my son into. I worried we would go to war in the middle east, and I worried it might result in a draft.

Much of my worry was justified. There was some violence against "foreigners" in the weeks after the attacks, although most wound up being perpetrated on poor east Indians because the ignorant fucks who made these racist attacks don't know the difference between a Muslim and a Punjabi. Not that the Muslims deserved it either...I'm just saying these things were done by the worst and most ignorant of our countrymen.

The Bush administration railroaded through the Patriot Act, which I consider to be one of the worst legal precedents in my lifetime. The Patriot Act, the attitude of xenophobia and "you're with us or against us" that the President happily fostered, and other so-called "programs" of the "War on Terror" (such as the NSA warrantless wiretapping) pissed all over the First, Fourth, and Sixth Amendments. Then Bush used 9/11 as a supporting reason to push us into this war with Iraq, which I feel is unjust and horrible for us as a nation.

I did, however, support the attack on Afghanistan. I am a peaceful man, I hate war. But I do understand that sometimes it is necessary. Attacking Afghanistan to remove the Taliban and hunt down the terrorists living under their protection was needed. I wish our government had done a better job of it, but I am glad they did something.

I'm sure today many will spend time thinking back on that day, and of the many people who lost their lives. The loss of the attack victims, their families, and for our country will never be forgotten. Nor will the heroism of the police, firefighters, and everyone else who helped in those tragedies, and that of our armed forces who went to fight the enemy on their own turf.

If you've read this far, thank you for putting up with my rambling, sad memorial. Mattbear out.