There’s so much going on today in Western New York. It has the potential to be a really fun day.
Of course, mostof us will be in front of the TV at 1:00 to watch the Bills season opener. Are you all stocked up on beer & munchies?
But there’s other stuff going on around town. Maybe you’re thinking of heading up to Niagara Falls for the Blues Festival. As long as you’re in Niagara County, why not go to the Peach Festival in Lewiston? The Sunset Hill Festival in Colden sounds like fun too.
Or you could go to a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of 9-11.
Yep, that’s today. Has it really been 10 years since that terrible day when our world changed forever?
So if you’re planning to have fun today, which most of us are…..do you feel guilty about that? I don’t. I don’t think that makes us unpatriotic, or un-American. Because life goes on. People are celebrating birthdays today. Couples are celebrating wedding anniversaries.
That doesn’t mean I won’t think about that day, and all the lives that were lost. I may pause and look at the clock this morning and think “this is the time it happened”. Or I may not think about it until later in the morning. But I will think about it….and I’m sure you will too.
There’s actually a lot I’ll think about. I’ll think about what it was like to work in the newsroom at Channel 2 that day. Journalists are kind of like first responders when things like that happen. We don’t have time to dwell on what’s happening….we have to do our jobs. Managing a newsroom in Buffalo on that day had its challenges. We have an international border…get a crew to the Peace Bride. What about the air base in the Falls….get someone there. Wait, we have one of the world’s largest power plants in our backyard…we have to cover that. Plus the usual local sidebars…the airport, bus & train station, command center……not to mention waiting to find out how many local victims were among the dead. I remember marveling at how cooperative their families were with the media on the worst day of their lives.
Speaking of families….back then, mine lived in California. I remember calling my parents when there was a moment….and calling my sister, who was less than two weeks away from having her first child. We wondered what kind of a world that child was entering.
I have better memories of that first week. I remember how Western New Yorkers came together to help, however they could. The long lines at blood drives. The donations. The prayers. I remember that Friday, when we held a mini telethon for the Red Cross. In just a few hours, it raised hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Speaking of life going on, we celebrated the birth of a co-worker’s first child.
For weeks, 9-11 was all we thought about. Eventually, that changed. But a year later, the first anniversary was another wall-to-wall coverage day….and once again, we were flooded with memories.
But the second anniversary wasn’t that big of a deal….the third, even less….and September 11th became another day again. A day for festivals. Weddings. And football. The Bills played on September 11th in 2005. And they won the game.
That nephew of mine, who was born a few weeks after the attacks, is coming over to my house today with his younger brother to watch today’s Bills game. In fact, for us, today is a family day. Football with the boys, along with Mom & Dad. Dinner with them and my sister & brother-in-law. (It’s Grandparents Day, by the way…again, helping life go on)
So I’m planning to have fun today and I’m not going to feel guilty. Yes, I’ll think about what happened 10 years ago today. I’ll do that on every anniversary….not to mention other days….but I won’t dwell on it, and I won’t feel bad about feeling good. And I think that’s pretty good.
Oh, one last memory. Two months after 9-11, like millions of other country music fans, I tuned in to the CMA awards. Alan Jackson took the stage, and millions of people cried all over again.
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