Saturday, September 11, 2010

Time Will Never Heal This Wound

DRAFT

As a child I remember hearing the old adage that "time heals all wounds" and I half-heartedly believed it. On this, the nine year anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the United States I am convinced that no matter how much time passes, it will never heal the wounds that were inflicted upon our country that day. 

Nor should it.

An incurable anger was born that day.

For the past week the cable channel lineup has become increasingly populated with broadcasts of the events of that deadly day.  Although I am well aware of  how unpleasantly the story ends, I am compelled to watch. A good deal of the footage is unsanitized:  raw video of doomed innocents jumping to their certain deaths rather face incineration from the rapidly spreading jet-fueled fires.  I rejected the sickening story that people were indeed jumping when one of my co-workers shared that fact with me long before it was reported on the news. Not only could I not believe her, in a small way was angry that she would even voice such a horrific possibility.  I could not wrap my brain around the concept that so many people could give up hope. I had always believed that suicide was wrong, it is a sin.

I can't watch the memorials.  I can't listen to the somber recitation of the listing of the dead. I can't bear to see the tears of the family members of the victims.