5/1/11

May, 1st is surprisingly more historically important than you may think.

Years ago, it was the day that Hitler was announced to be dead. 

Last night, another monster was announced dead; Osama Bin Laden.

We all know where we were on September 11th, 2001, am I right? 

I happened to be sitting in science class when the teachers finally put the televisions on for us all to watch. I sat there, as a young, naive 8th grader, not sure what exactly the Twin Towers even were. My teacher asked the class if any family happened to be traveling by plane that morning.

My heart literally stopped.

My dad was flying into Chicago that morning. 

All the blood drained from my face. I stood up, no longer thinking straight, and ran to the nurses office.

The nurse asked me what was wrong, and I choked back tears as I told her my dad was on a plane that morning.

That sure caught the attention of not only the nurse, but the secretaries, assistant principal, and a few passerby's.

They all held in their breath when I called home to see if my dad had be spared.

My mom answered, clearly crying.

Thankfully, she quickly was able to spit out that my dad was okay. His plane never left that morning because word had traveled quickly of the attacks.

Everyone's lives changed drastically from these few moments that bright morning.

And we all had these moments like mine.

That exact moment where the panic, the fear, and the terror immediately sank in..

The sad thing was, not everyone was as blessed.

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Last night, as I was vegging on the couch, watching my dvr of Real Housewives, I told Joel that all of my twitter friends were tweeting about a live press conference Obama was due to have.

We changed the channel and the headlines said it all: Osama Bin Laden was dead.

As we waited for our president to speak, I spent 45 minutes in a swirl of anxiety and fear. Newscasters speaking about fear of retaliation and counter punches, and that moment, ten years ago, sitting in the nurse office came right back to me.

As President Obama delivered a short and powerful speech, I began to cry thinking of the thousands of American's lives that have been lost in this battle. I cried for all of those people who left behind brothers, sisters, children, parents, grandparents, girlfriends, friends, boyfriends, fiances. I cried for all of the moments too many people had to miss.

And, I cried for the fear of uncertainty for the future.

I'm not going to lie and say that I'm not afraid of these crazy monsters that attack innocent people. It scares me to think that they are very mad at us that we killed their leader and that they're likely to show us just how mad they are.

I was afraid to get on the el this morning. I was fearful that I work in high rise building in downtown Chicago. I was worried that my parents had to fly in plane today.

It's a scary world we live in, no doubt, but I (am trying to) refuse to let spineless terrorists scare me.