Never forget...

Ten years ago today I was at work. I was in a...transition phase of my life. I had left my job at the University of Memphis Art Department to pursue my big dream of working in New York City, which had spectacularly blown up in my face. When I returned home to Memphis, I was jobless. My old position at UofM had been filled, and I had no idea what I was going to do with my life. So I had gotten a job shelving books at Barnes and Noble to pay the bills until I got a grip. And that's what I was doing on the morning of September 11, 2001. I was shelving books. The store hadn't opened yet, so it was only staff in the store when the news first came in. One of the assistant managers of the store came running out of the office to tell everyone that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center. Then he changed the store's music channel to the news, and we all listened in horror at the news reports of what was going on in the city that I had only just recently departed.

When I think back to that day, it seems life a lifetime ago. And for me I guess it was. Long gone are those days when I didn't know what I was doing with my life. And long gone are the days when I felt a sense of security that I truly believed to be impenetrable. Four months later I started nursing school. Two years later I was a registered nurse, which is a career I proudly did for four years. And then in 2008, I met this nerdy gamer guy who incidentally was a combat medic in the U.S. Army. And since then my life has truly found it's purpose. On December 7, 2009, on the 68th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, I gave birth to my son. And as is the case with many a military child's birth since 9/11, his father was in Iraq when he was born.

Many American lives changed on September 11, 2001. And on that horrific day in New York City, New Yorkers and Americans everywhere made the promise that they would never forget. And while some people may have slipped back into the comfortable complacency that they are safe in this country, they have only done so thanks to the sacrifices that have been and continue to be made by so many brave patriots of this beautiful country. So on this ten year anniversary of September 11, 2001, hug your babies and your spouses and your family, thank someone who would sacrifice his or her very life for your freedom, and remember what you swore to never forget.