9-1-1

I never once believed that the terrorist attacks of September 11th fell on that day by any chance or coincidence. The numbers 911 have come to be associated with emergency, distress, and fear. I can remember feeling all of those things when my mother told me what had happened as she drove me home from my school day, one month into second grade at a new school. It was a strange and sudden switch of emotions, for, only moments before, I had been ecstatic at the thought of celebrating my sister's sixth birthday.

That evening, I walked in on my parents talking behind closed doors. It was a relatively new occurrence, but not nearly as rare as seeing my father cry. He was, though: One of his close friends had been the captain of one of the two planes that were hijacked and flown into the World Trade Center. The aftermath of the September 11th Terrorist Atacks is well-documented as one of the more tumultous times in US--and world--history, as the United States vowed to take a stand against terrorism:a cry of defiance, and not of fear.

I know that things most assuredly changed at my home. My father, being a pilot, grew anxious at the thought of his job securtiy; air travel still hasn't fully recovered today, ten years after that horrific display of hate and utter disregard for human life.

Those events brought about a change in my mind at a very young age and I began to muse over whether or not you must you know someone to hate them. Surely, as you must know one to truly and wholly love thm, then hate, being also a strong emotion, requires that same knowledge. And even so, we proclaim love wihtout true thought or acquaintance. But that is not true love, just as hate without acquaintance is not true hate but rather a mutated, unfounded form.

Yet both love and hate without basis are each tempting, exceptionally alluring. Some overly-developed part of our minds desires those emotions to the extent that we are content to imagine their existence. What portion of our minds perverts our own emotions? Perhaps the same portion that protects us from falling back into the feral thought process that has evolved past necessity and even past indulgence, to a gross decadence.

Love evolved within us so that we might care for others and conversely have them care for us as well. Hate evolved from that same love, a natural course of logical process, for to love and desire something or someone so fiercely as to protect is with your life, so also must you despise that thing that would threaten to destroy the object of your love.

Therefore, I stand firmly by my declaration that I hate those people who bring about fear and death and violence through acts of terror. I hate those people who would kill my family because of their differing beliefs, infidel to some. I require no knowledge to base this hatred in, for I have an overabundance of knowledge to and of love. One does not require knowledge for each, but knowledge only of one, for the other will certainly follow.

Today, I salute the troops of all countries who are stationed away from their loved ones this beautiful, late-summer day for their courage and sacrifice. Today, I remember all of those who lost thier lives--literally and emblematically--in the Terrorist of Attacks of Septemper 11th, 2001, and every other terrorist attack that has marred the history of the world. Today I salute the citizens of the United States, my countrymen, who stood so unwaveringly by our flag and our beliefs.

Love always and forever,

Fae