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There was no announcement on the morning of September 11, 2001 — not really. Events were tumbling over each other like a chaotic nightmare. Everyone was trying to grapple with facts, fears, shock. There was no announcement, but there was a flag. It was large and tattered, lashed to a wooden pole. The arms waving it were thin and dirty. They belonged to a homeless man whom I had seen before along that same stretch of highway; usually, he held a cardboard sign asking for money. Now, in the early dawn, while California was waking up to what New York already knew — that America had been horribly wounded and might never be the same again — this man had found a flag somewhere and was waving it like a proud soldier, announcing to passersby that he loved the country whose streets he calls home. Many of us didn't realize how profound our feelings for America were until the wounds of that day. So often, it's grief that illuminates our deepest loves — for a person, a country, a place. It's as if the flow of tears washes away debris, makes us see more clearly. I wept when I saw that ragged flag held between ragged hands on such a sad and desperate morning. I thought of Emma Lazarus's poem engraved on the Statue of Liberty. "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses . . .," it begins. In the weeks that followed, I wept almost every time I saw a flag or heard the verses of "America the Beautiful." Yet behind my tears was the memory of a young girl who, decades ago, used to talk about leaving America, who was angry at the war in a jungle country called Vietnam where fresh-faced boys were being sent to slaughter and be slaughtered. "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam?" John Kerry asked the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 22, 1971. "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" Many of us looked at the flag in those years and thought only about America's mistakes. We felt betrayed. We talked about escaping, becoming ex-patriots. As if the world wasn't the small blue ball that it is. As if other countries have a special immunity from the messiness of life. We grew up, we didn't leave; we learned to accept that countries, like people, make mistakes. One day in September we woke up to see history once again divided into "before" and "after." We're easy to spot now. Our eyes still fill with tears when we hear the National Anthem, or when we look up and see a flag waving dramatically against a white-cloud sky. But study us carefully — you'll also see a flicker of surprise in our eyes. We're still a bit bewildered by how strongly patriotism has gripped our hearts. History will record that on a blue September morning, huge planes were flown like missiles into tall buildings by terrorists who hated us. Thousands of innocent people were killed instantly. Others jumped from heights where birds usually fly — except the birds were gone, taking wing to escape the smoke and flames. People fell from the sky and then the towers crumbled — one after the other. A flood of smoke and debris swept through downtown Manhattan like a river from hell. It was never supposed to happen, yet it did. In the days that followed, the skies were empty and still. No planes flew, and when they did fly again, passengers looked around and imagined what it must have been like in those last awful moments. Years from now, children will read about the firemen who ran up the stairs into black smoke and fire, trying to save someone, anyone, because that's what they do. Those firemen never came down, and funeral bells tolled through the streets of Manhattan day after day until every one of them was laid to rest. Some children will ask their parents, "Where were you on that morning?" And everyone will remember. History will preserve the words of the passengers on the doomed planes — the phone calls placed just before the end. Their voices will trail us, echo in our memories, make us stop sometimes and remember that life can change in an instant. But history should also record this: A country called America, though badly wounded on a morning that was supposed to be just an ordinary Tuesday, rose from the ashes and stood taller than she ever had before. It was the worst day anyone could have imagined, yet we reached for the best in ourselves. We flew flags from car windows and taped them to our doors and buildings because the flag represented freedom and in the darkest moments we knew freedom was the light that would guide us. History will record the deaths and the terrible losses, but it should also acknowledge that, through the tears, through the grief that felt like it would splinter us, we learned to wrap our arms around life and hold on to it like we never had before. It takes strong people to do that; it takes people whose hearts are tough and big and willing to love even through the pain. Someday, New Yorkers in a certain part of the city, who once looked out their windows at the World Trade Center, will talk about the gash in the skyline, the vast field of ruin and death that came to be known as Ground Zero. And then they'll talk about what they see from their windows now. The Statue of Liberty. The last lines of Emma Lazarus's poem on the base of the statue read: "Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" Before September 11, we often forgot that freedom is our golden door; we gave little thought to the Statue of Liberty, who represents the Roman goddess Libertas. She is said to "light the way." After September 11, we don't forget anymore. — Patti Davis — the daughter of President and Mrs. Reagan — is an author and frequent contributor to magazines. |
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here are days that change everything, days that divide history into "before"
and "after." The day President Kennedy was shot is one. I was
eleven years old and we were called outside at my school to witness the
flag being lowered to half-mast. Then the announcement was made. We all
grew so much older that day, and in the days that followed. We would never
be as innocent again.
