Seven Years Ago...

Alternate title: No politics, please.

Seven years ago today, at 8:46AM EST, our world changed irrevocably.

19 men armed with sharp knives and sharper ideology slashed and beat their way to control of four airplanes. They then used these airplanes as missiles, intent on causing as much death and destruction as possible. They left three demolished buildings, one scarred building, and thousands of people dead in their orgy of violence and mayhem.

Two planes hit the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, at the time one of the financial centers of the free world. One plane hit the Pentagon, where the brains of the mighty US military congregate to plan how to best keep our nation and our way of life safe from harm. One more plane landed in a field in Pennsylvania, its target unclear, but its purpose just as deadly. The four men who commandeered that plane were prevented from achieving their terrible goal by ordinary Americans giving their lives so that others may live.

There were villians that day. Grotesque, evil caricatures of what was once human, men who hewed to a twisted ideology that claimed paradise and sexual gratification beyond compare lay in store for those who died while killing infidels. Their "holy" places urged them on, telling them that there could be no finer end to their existence than slaying those who did not worship as they did.

But there were heroes that day. Men who ran into deformed and flaming buildings while others ran screaming out. Men who advanced up staircase after staircase, lugging heavy equipment intended to save lives, all the while waiting for the building to crumple. On United Airlines Flight 93, men banded together to fight the evil personified by the four hijackers who had taken control of the plane. Alerted to the intentions of these wicked men, they fought a battle whose outcome was predetermined - death - with the sole purpose of sparing those on the ground.

And they won. They gave their lives so that others would live.

I remember holding my infant son, only 9 months old, and watching the carnage on television. The video of the second plane hitting the South Tower played on an endless loop, burned into our brains from the massive fireball and destruction. I could only cower helplessly in my seat, a schism of pain and anger ripping apart my soul; torn between soul-crushing despair and white-hot anger. I knew that someone had to pay for these heinous crimes; had the President ordered an all-out nuclear assault on the entire Middle East I'd have volunteered to push the button myself.

I remember watching the bodies. Oh my God, the bodies. Men and women hurling themselves out of 100-story high windows because the heat and smoke of the fire was too much for them to bear. Video from the scene was interspersed with stomach-churning "thud"s as bodies hit the ground. Cameras captured bodies on their way down, a voyeuristic snapshot of death imminent.

And I watched the towers collapse, first the South Tower, then the North Tower. News reports estimated the number of people who worked in those towers on any given day to be between 50,000 and 100,000. The death toll was presumed to be staggeringly high - as many as 25,000 dead, then 10,000, then 5,000. Even the final number, nearly 3,000 people killed in the attacks, was greater than any other attack on US soil in our nation's history.

I lost a friend on Flight 77. Vicky Yancey was a poster on the old TimeOnline/Pathfinder bulletin boards where I had my first online political discussions. She was unfailingly polite; someone who I did not agree with ideologically but respected greatly as a person for her cheery personality and unfailing love for her family and her country. Those monsters murdered her for no crime other than her very existence.

As I type this I am choking back tears, tears of great sadness but also towering rage.

Take a moment to remember the heroes of September 11^th. Remember the men and women of the NYPD and NYFD and NY EMS who sacrificed their lives trying to help those unfortunate souls trapped in the World Trade Center. Think of the 9-1-1 operator on the phone with someone trapped on the 101^st floor, knowing full well that they were lying through their teeth when they told that person that help was on the way. Help was not on the way, as the middle portion of the building no longer existed. That operator must replay that phone call every minute of their nightmares.

Never forget that there is evil out there, an evil so monstrous that words alone cannot fully capture its depravity. Men and women so thoroughly brainwashed by a demented perversion of religious zealotry that they believe it better to die while killing others than to live among them.

There is no rationalizing with these people. There is only complete and utter defeat. Whether we choose to be the victors, or the victims, lies entirely with us. They are resolute and steadfast in their quest to destroy us; only we can allow that to happen or push them back under the rocks from which they crawled out.

Hug your children, everyone. My son kept me sane that fateful day, a smiling infant untouched by the horror I had witnessed. I've been pushing myself to be a better person, to make this world a little better place, all because of my kids. I need to set the example that, while there is tremendous evil all around us, there is also goodness.

That is all.