Just Another Day

Today marks the seventh anniversary of the attacks perpetrated on the United States on September 11, 2001.
We really don’t have a good name for this day.

There needs to be a special name for this day along the lines of other days such as Memorial Day, Labor Day, Veteran’s Day, or Independence Day.

Most Americans simply refer to it as, “9/11”.

Personally, I have corrected this lack of a name for 9/11 with the following:

“Rudy Giuliani, While Personally Unpleasant, Showed Up for Work, Posed with Firefighters Who Lacked Equipment and Logistical Support and Somehow Managed to be Taken Seriously as a Leader and Later a Presidential Candidate Day.”©

I think the name pretty much sums it up, but I’ll be damned how the hell I can fit that onto a greeting card or a T-Shirt.

More importantly, aside from the name of the observance, I have a far greater problem with this day…I just can’t get worked up about it on a macro-emotional way any longer.

Oh sure, I am still saddened about the incredible loss of life and the lasting effects it has had on countless families.

And of course, I still get pissed off thinking about the penultimate in cowardice of the planners and hijackers, but…

9/11 has become nothing more than a semaphore for political fear mongering, meaningless color coded charts, and a call to arms against third rate Muslim nations.

It has, for a sizable minority of Americans, become a seed that has been sewn and has yielded a crop of overt, religious bigotry.

I have come to detest this day...

Not only because of the attacks themselves, but for the empty speeches, poll driven tears, and the manipulation of this tragic event by some to elicit visceral reactions in order to promote their agendas, as well.

I am off today, and will be listening to talk radio and watching some memorial events on TV.

I am sure I will be disappointed by the infusion of political ideologies into these observances.

I’ll become nauseous as I hear the royalties ring up for Lee Greenwood as he sings about how proud he is, while yet another radio station cues up studio tough guy Toby Keith singing about stickin’ a boot up somebody’s ass.

I’m sorry to be such a bummer, but after seven years, I don’t feel much of anything on this day. If anything; I feel, for lack of a better word, ickiness.

9/11 has been turned into a billboard…a yard sign…a 30 second sound bite…a joke.

Today, I am going to simply pray a word of peace for the victims and their families, and then go about my day.

Cheers!!