Lest We Forget, Part 2

(This post is scheduled to appear at 9:03 AM, the time that the second plane, Flight 175, hit the second tower at the World Trade Center.)

I wanted to use this post to explain the title I've given this series of posts. I have a very real concern that the American public will forget what happened to our country on September 11, 2001. Of course I don't mean that in the extremely literal sense - there will be enough media coverage about the date itself to ensure that people will always remember that *something* happened on that date. But what will people remember?

Will people remember that this was the first time since Pearl Harbor that our nation was directly attacked? Or will they just remember that a couple of planes crashed into a few buildings and a meaningless field? Will they even remember that a fourth plane crashed into a field, rather than be used as another jet fuel-filled bomb?

Will people remember that Muslim extremist terrorists planned for months to execute this attack in a well-orchestrated fashion, using resources here in this country to help them prepare?
Or will they just remember that America some how "deserved" what happened on that day? This thought makes me particularly ill.

Will people remember that innocent Americans were jumping from the World Trade Center towers, hoping that they might somehow survive the fall because they knew the fire and the impending tower collapse would surely kill them?
Or will they just remember that some nameless and faceless people died that day.

Will people remember that over 3,000 people with names and faces and families who loved them lost their lives that day, between the sites in New York, Pennsylvania and Washington DC? People like Lt. Jonas Panik, who you'll read more about in the next post.
Or will they just remember what happened in New York City?

Will the history books my future children read in school accurately describe the events of not just September 11, 2001 itself, but also what lead up to it? Will those books give the proper amount of honor and respect to the individuals who were heroes on that day? Will it talk about the brave souls who tried to stop the planes from being hijacked? And what about the individuals who were perhaps even more brave, who caused the plane to crash in that field in western Pennsylvania - sacrificing themselves so that another location did not become the site of another attack?
Or will I have to provide this kind of education myself? You can bet that I will, regardless of what the history books say. My children will not grow up without knowing the truth of the events of that day, just like my children will learn, in age-appropriate ways, about the events of the Holocaust.

These are the things that I think about this day. This is why I wrote this series of posts, and why I wrote in remembrance of the day last year. So that I can my part to ensure we never forget.

Our ignorance of history causes us to slander our own times.

- Gustave Flaubert

History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived,

but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.

- Maya Angelou