Where were you September 11, 2001?

Time does very funny things to people...

(This was written as an answer to a friends statement in Facebook, about today's subdued coverage of September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, and the national news preferential treatment of the Kardashian's butt jobs, over the solemn nature of this day in still recent history.)

September 11, 2001, began a 3 day ordeal for me as our Navy Hospital went on lock down.  However we couldn't close our Emergency Room due to the number of people we ended up seeing in shock, quite literally hearts broke. My shipmates and I stood outside the front gate of the base, and triaged many people into emergent and pass to the Emergency Department, or asked them to please go home and wait for us to call you.  We recorded all the names, and called them all over the next week, as we set up a temporary hospital in a more advantageous area for our public.

I'll never forget how understanding everyone was, how they brought us food, coffee, umbrellas, and general thanks.  We, as a nation, felt part of something very very terrible.  We, as a nation, were all numb, stunned, and breathless.  As anger tried to set in, it was everyone lining the streets with OUR FLAG and OUR NATIONAL pride started to soar, like OUR precious Bald Eagle flying higher and higher about to strike it's prey, but when the time was right.

I've been retired now for 10 years.  I knew two people who died in the Pentagon, and one who died in the Towers.  I have never watched an episode of the Kardashian's. I despise the political rhetoric that we are forced to lay witness to, and I hope to never forget that on September 14th, 2001, I was sailing on the Puget Sound with my family in an very quiet bubble... no flights, no ferries, no tankers, no other boaters except the US Coast Guard.

We were most respectfully pulled over and searched by a team of young professionals that understood what they were doing, and why they had stopped us, and after hearing each others stories, let us sail off, as we were CITIZENS of this worlds GREATEST FREE SOCIETY.

Don't sweat the Kardashian's. Don't worry about the absence and subdued nature of remembering September 11th, or December 7th for that matter. This nation is continually protected by the best people there is in the world. They are your sons, your daughters, your uncles, aunts, fathers, and mothers.

They are on watch, in order to protect your right to watch the Kardashian's, post and spread political rhetoric, say and speak to whom ever you chose, hold a job, and to pray where ever and to whomever you chose, among many other liberties. And it is done quietly, almost silently, and some have died for your RIGHT to do so.

Remember quietly if you need to, loudly if you feel the need to, and if the urge hits you write something, or sing, or cry, or remember someone's laugh, and laugh for those who will never laugh again.  But be sure that you will be able to do it tomorrow, next week, and next year, and as sure as your are a CITIZEN of the GREATEST and MOST FREE NATION WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN, for the rest of your life.

PEACE TO ALL OF US!


Campy Out!