Dear
Boo and Bubble,
Today
marks the 15th anniversary of a most dark and sad day in the history
of our country – the attack by Al Qaeda on the Twin Towers in New York City and
the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. For all
Americans, these incidents became a “stop” moment in our lives whereby the
time, place and circumstances of where we were are forever seared into our
memories, never to be forgotten.
At
the time, I was Executive Director of Central Midlands Habitat for Humanity in
Columbia, SC. I remember heading to an
appointment with a potential donor, when a call from Aunt Bee, who was
attending the College of Charleston, came through to my cellphone. She had been watching The Today Show on television and there was news that a plane had just
crashed into one of the towers. I
envisioned a small, private plane that had perhaps suffered some malfunction in
its controls or worse, someone committing the fatal act of suicide. However, she explained that reports indicated
it was a large commercial jet liner. As
we talked, her voice paused and she let out a gasp. Looking at the television screen, she
witnessed in horror a second plane careening through the stately glass and steel
structure of the second tower. It
became obvious to her, to me and to everyone in the world that this must be a
deliberate act off aggression and it shook all of us to the core.
I had
no choice but to keep my appointment. It
was with a doctor at Lexington Medical Center who hoped to fund a house for one
of the nurse’s aides that worked there.
The news from New York had spread throughout the facility and neither he
nor I could concentrate on our intended business. We agreed to meet again later.
As I
drove back towards my office, the cellphone rang again. It was a female voice I did not recognize.
“Beth, this Elaine ……… Grayson’s mother. I just want you to know that he was able to
call me and they both are okay.”
Your
mom and dad had just moved to the D.C. area and were renting an apartment right across
the Interstate from the Pentagon. I had
no clue what she was talking about and asked her what was going on. She filled me in on the plane that crashed
into the Pentagon. Luckily, both of your parents were in D.C. proper when it happened.
Your mom was interviewing for a job and your dad had accompanied her on
the train to make sure she found the right station to exit. He tried to make his way back home by train,
but all mass transportation had been stopped.
He ended up on the mall in the shadows of the Washington Monument. Thousands of people funneled to the open
space which was considered safer than being in buildings that could possibly be
attack targets. He had called your
grandmother Elaine from there and asked her to call me. This was the first time she and I had ever
spoken.
It
was a horrific day in the psyche of our nation.
Initially, there was a kind of incredible unity among us that a shared
trauma can generate. And once the enemy
identified itself as the perpetrator of this strike against us, there was an
instant galvanization – almost completely around the world – against them. Looking back at the point in time from
fifteen years later, I marvel that it could be so because the events that have
occurred since then seem to have put us back in the same bubbling cauldron of
contentious stew where we found ourselves before it all happened.
Understanding
that there is an oceanic divide between the personal realm and the political
nation…..and that sometimes what works in the one does not in the other….I
still grapple with the correct response one should have after experiencing such
an ordeal. The visceral temptation to
cast aspersions, to foster suspicion and abhorrence, is a very real one. But, I believe I must avoid it. It serves no purpose but to feed the gerbil wheel
of hate.
In
going through the scrapbooks of your great, great, great, great grandfather
Joseph Benson Cottrell, I found a poem that resonated with me on this
matter. I don’t know whether he wrote it
or whether he clipped it out of the newspaper to keep as material for one of
his sermons. That is neither here nor
there. It’s the words that are
important.
No
Time for Hating
Be gone with feud! Away with strife;
Our human hearts unmating!
Let us be friends again – this life
Is all too short for hating.
So dull the day, so dim the way,
So rough the road we’re faring –
Far better weal with faithful friend
Than stalk alone uncaring.
The barren fig, the withered vine
Are types of selfish living;
But souls that give, like thine and mine,
Renew their life by giving.
While cypress waves o’er early graves,
On all the way we’re going,
Far better plant where seed is scant
Than tramp o’er broken roses.
Of what are all the joys we hold
Compared to joys above us?
And what are rank, and power and gold,
Compared to hearts that love us?
So fleet our years, so full of fears,
So closely death is waiting;
God gives us space for loving grace,
But
leaves not time for hating.
