9 - 11 - 10

My mind was full of memories, today, as we marked the nine - year anniversary of the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil in our history as a nation.

I've been thinking, today, about how that morning, 9 - 11 - 01, started for me; with a phone call received by my mother as I slept.... I was awakened by hearing her saying "NO!! OH NO!!" In a voice I had never heard her use before.... and I knew instantly that something terrible had happened. The world had somehow changed forever in those hours between my drifting off to sleep and waking...

The next sound I heard was that of the radio going on, and then, a horrified news anchor was recounting the soul - wrenching events that would change our lives forever. Our innocence as a Nation had been violated, and we would never get it back...

I am sure that all of you, too, remember exactly where you were, and what you were doing, on that September morning ... for those terrible hours, and indeed, that entire week, remains forever burned into our minds with the scorching flames of shock, sorrow, agony, and then, righteous anger.

How I leaned on the Master during those painful and frightening days! I remember going to the church during that awful week with Daddy to seek my Jesus in prayer....and He was there waiting for me, and those Hands that created the universe, and that have nail prints in them... reached out and drew me close, and comforted me as only He can... as I wept and sobbed and mourned for the families of the dead... those precious little ones that did not have a mother or daddy any more.... and those husbands and wives that were so suddenly bereft of the other halves of their hearts... and the mothers and fathers whose sons and daughters were wrenched away from them too soon... and for so many others...

9 -11 was a time in which I gained a better understanding of what it means to be a hero... as we learned of the firefighters that perished saving lives, and of the police and the medical personnel, and the rescue and recovery teams, and countless others, that gave so selflessly of themselves to their Country; in her hour of distress and great need....

It was a time in which our American spirit... the beautiful Eagle, did not cower and hide... but gained strength and soared... we knew in our hearts that we were not defeated...no cowardly, wild - eyed, crazed fanatic could do that to us, regardless of his planes and his terrorist threats..... and we knew, too, that we would not forget those that perished.... and we have not forgotten... and we will not forget...