September Eleventh

Today is a day that people tell their stories. Where you were when you heard the news, what you did, who you knew. To be honest, most people's stories aren't that interesting; most of us lived far away from the horror and didn't have any personal connection to it. But each person's story matters to him or her. That story is the story of the moment your life changed.

Many years, it seems September 11 passes without too too much mention. The little blurb in the upper right-hand corner of your paper says something like, "Families remember victims of September 11 attacks, p. 8." There's some brief news clip of some memorial service. And that's it. Feel free to go ahead and plan your wedding, birthday party, yard sale, fair, or cat show that day. (I actually went to a cat show on Sept. 11, 2004.) It's just another day.

This year it seems people are remembering a little bit more, no doubt in response to the latest idiocy that has given bad publicity to Sept. 11. I'm talking about the whole flap over the Muslim community center at Ground Zero and the guy in Florida who wanted to burn the Qua'ran.
But, it's good we remember.

My story is one of the ones that is totally uninteresting to outsiders, but represents an important lesson for me.

September 10, 2001 was my very first day as a teacher. Preparing your classroom for the school year, especially your very first year, is one of the most stressful parts of being a teacher. There was so much stress and anxiety and anticipation going into that day, and when nothing went as planned on that first Monday I went home and wilted into a heap of tears. I fell asleep at 7 p.m., not even making it to Ally McBeal. I probably didn't explicitly think the words It cannot possibly be any worse tomorrow, but I think my feelings were somewhere along those lines.

And then the next day ... well, you know what happened the next day.

It got worse.

It was an emotionally exhausting day, week, and year for me, and for our country. How could we go on? What should we do? How could this happen? What would happen next?

In some ways, I think nobody will ever be able to comprehend the magnitude of the horror that happened that day. We can't wrap our heads around it. We don't want to.

And so, we move on. That's the way it should be. It would be strange if, for the rest of America's existence, everybody walked around looking sad like they did during the weeks after the attack.

But, some days we should be sad. We should remember. I should remember the lesson I learned that day; that it could always be worse.

It's a trite lesson. A total cliche. And, quite frankly, it's a lesson that doesn't have much usefulness. My job every single day is to make sure my family and I stay alive for another day. Remembering those less fortunate gives me some perspective when I'm feeling sorry for myself, but it doesn't get Nathan dressed for the day or food in the cat's dish. And when I remember that my problems are dumb and petty compared to the horrible problems of others, that doesn't help me solve my problems. Sometimes it just makes me feel like a self-centered jerk.

But what we can remember in the face of tragedy is to appreciate everything we do have. Again, it's a cliche, but somehow in spite of its triteness it's still hard to count your blessings.

Today, I counted them.

Here is what I did on September 11, 2010:

Today the little monkey and I went to the farmer's market. It has recently become a Saturday tradition for us to go to the farmer's market and the library next door, and to stop at garage sales that we see along the way. I am not naturally a garage sale person. I'm a little grossed out by other people's belongings, and I still can't bring myself to buy their clothes. But lately I have realized that I could spend way less money if I bought things second-hand, so I'm dipping my toe into the resale world. But mostly I go to garage sales for the boy. If you can find a fun toy for a quarter or $2, you can get a lot of bang for your buck in terms of pleasing little kids.

Now, yesterday we happened upon a garage sale where he got a really fun scooter for $1. But today's garage sales were kind of duds. If they don't have toys that they're getting rid of because their kids happened to outgrow them, they usually just have crap they're getting rid of because it's ugly. As in, most of the non-kid items I find at garage sales are hideous things that I would try to sell, too, if I owned them. But then I feel bad if I don't buy something, especially when the sellers are talking to me. So I bought Nathan a 25-cent patriotic bear stuffed animal. (See, for Sept. 11?) This violated two rules of mine: (1) Never buy anything with a soft, germ-absorbing surface from a garage sale, and (2) Do not seek to actively acquire more stuffed animals for the child. But, since the bear still had the tag on it and was being sold by elderly people (thus making it less likely to have been drooled on by a child), and since my kid was over-the-moon excited to be getting such an item, I said yes.

At the farmer's market, we spent $20. I did not come home with a single item of produce. Instead we bought expensive aged cheddar and smoked string cheese, a big fat cookie with M&Ms in it, a long baguette of pretzel bread, and a bag of kettle corn.

We went to the library and signed the boy up for story hour. And then I bought him another book from the library book sale. It was a crappy book that he just bought for the sake of buying something, but, again, if all it costs is a quarter to make the kid happy, I'll take it. (Of course, given that he doesn't really understand the value of money, he'll probably still end up all spoiled.)

I showed Nathan some books from a library display on Sept. 11. I explained that on this day some terrible people did some terrible things, and many people died. He saw a book about how dogs helped in the rescue efforts. He asked if the dogs killed the bad guys. Clearly he didn't totally get it. But then, who does?

After the library (oh, and another dud yard sale), we went home and got Bill, and we all went to a local fair. I collected a bunch of free tote bags, and Nathan got a fish tattoo. The rides were free, so he did a bouncy castle and the horrible spinning strawberries. (The latter really only being horrible for me, because I get dizzy easily.) We ate more junk food.

Those were the parts of my day that were the blessings I counted. And I really thought, as I was going through these activities, that I was really enjoying simple activities with my family. I thought about how lucky I was to have such a wonderful family.

When we got home, that wonderful family and I cleaned the house. You have to work really hard to count your blessings while cleaning. I mean, yes, the fact that you have a house and so many, many belongings to pick up are, in fact, blessings. But come on, who am I, Ned Flanders?

But I am truly grateful for what I have. And, just for today, I take a moment to remember those who were lost on this day 9 years ago.

Here's a picture from today. It reminds me both of who we lost and of what I have to be grateful for: