Live every day to the fullest.
In other words: eat more Flourless Chocolate-Chip Cookies.
I struggled with today’s post.
Mostly, I struggled in deciding whether or not to publish any post today. Today: September 11th.
I’d completely forgotten until last night. My initial reaction was to unschedule the recipe post I’d written (ironically enough, for New York-style Cheesecake) and take a day off from blogging, in honor of the victims of 9/11. It seemed wrong and superficial to talk about desserts on the anniversary of a day so many innocent people lost their lives.
However, I’m not sure the victims of September 11th would want that. I think they would want us to honor their memories by celebrating life; by not taking a single moment—or a single person in our lives—for granted. Yes, it’s cliché to say, “Don’t take anything in your life for granted.” But just stop for a second and really think about the meaning behind the cliché. Think about aspects of your life that you do take for granted.
Personally, I can always use a reminder to put the little things—a failed recipe, a bad hair day, even a slow internet connection—in perspective. Likewise with people: instead of getting annoyed at a friend’s bad habit that drives me crazy, I should be grateful the friend is in my life and is therefore able to annoy me.
Also, as horrible as September 11th was, we need to remember that atrocities are still taking place every single day around the world. It’s easy to sit back and pretend we’re being patriotic by waving our American flags and spouting out phrases like: “I’m proud to be an American” and “Support our troops!” But what would really show patriotism would be to get out there and actually do something, whether it be volunteering at a food pantry, writing letters to the brave men and women fighting overseas, etc.
I was so active in high school—visiting nursing homes, making comfort pillows for a local hospital, going to the animal shelter, coordinating service projects through my church… I’m embarrassed to admit that as college work became more time-consuming, I cut back on these other activities and went from helping so many causes to helping very few. I really need to get back into it. Sitting home and pretending to be a good person helps no one.
Question of the Day:
Do you remember where you were on September 11th?
I was in high school, and when my math teacher told us a plane had hit the World Trade Center, I thought he was making a really bad joke. And then some kid did play a really bad joke—he called in a bomb threat to our school, so we spent the rest of the day huddled together in the football stadium. We were hot (It was over 100 degrees), hungry (Our lunches were left in the evacuated building) and scared, with no idea what was going on. Kids didn’t have iphones back then.
But when I got home, I obviously learned that, as bad as my day was, it paled in comparison to the day of so many others.
I was at home watching TV on a sunny September afternoon. Then suddenly the news started on every channel and I couldn’t believe my eyes. I still feel a little weird when I watch some old movie and the towers appear in the background.
I was in grade seven at the time and we had just come in from lunch. My teacher Mme Danielle came in and had this look of horror on her face. She had just finished telling us how she was walking her dog, went back in the house turned on the tv and was watching the news. She explained to us the incident that happened, while crying. At first I was a bit confused, not to say I was a dumb kid, but we were sitting there listening to her speak, and I’m doing the translation in my head from French to English, trying to figure out if I’d missed something, and the only thing I could think of is, why is she crying over tourism? Needless to say I didn’t quite understand until I went home and saw it on the news for myself.
Samantha
http://flavorator.blogspot.com/
I was in the supermarket with my mum right before I went off to uni….I remember people standing around the TVs in the store, looking on with shock. There was quite a crowd so I took a look and remember feeling all strange inside. Anger, shock, terror, helplessness…..and I still feel like that today as I think of the victims and the scene unfolding. Love to all on this day of reflection xoxoxo
Hey Katie! I really enjoyed this post. You’re so right about all you just said. We take too many things for granted, and that we should act instead of pretend.
On 9/11 I was in third grade in Brooklyn, New York. Unfortunately I didn’t care enough at that age. And my school hid it from us. For many months I lived smelling the tragedy, and it’s a smell I will never forget. The sky was raining burnt papers and for weeks after, every wall had missing persons papers. It was so horrible and I get emotional remembering. I remember when I went to visit my grandpa in the nursing home days after I looked out the windows and just saw the few remains. It looked like a few popsicle sticks put together.
Yes I remember exactly where I was. Scott and I had *just* moved across the country together and we were living 2000 miles from any friends or family in a quiet, remote, beach town when we heard the news. We truly only had each other and it was such a scary & surreal time. The memories of those ensuing days are burned in my brain, forever.
I think that your post is such a good reminder for many things…including take nothing for granted!
Its so weird considering i was sooo young, but i remember exactly where i was!! I was at school and my teacher came runninc back in the room and cut the TV on as soon as the second tower was hit!! I had no clue how big of a deal it was then either!! I was really active in highschool with volunteering and stuff too. Seems like now i dont have time for anything but college and work 🙁
I was a sophmore in high school and I was in chemistry lab. I remember we were al so excited because we got called out of class to go to a special assembly. I still feel awful to this day about how excited we were just mere moments before we found out about the catastrophe. Thanks for this post in honor of this day.
i don’t think i will ever really forget where I was on this day ten years ago. mostly, it was really confusing. I was 11 and in 6th grade-middle school. I remember, around 2nd period (i was in science class) the principal came in to our class and asked the teacher to step outside. She came back in, and i guess no one thought anything of it. Then, the same thing happened in my next class, chorus. The teacher got called out and talked to the principal. she came back in and seemed a little different, but not a big deal i guess. My next class was history. The principal called out the teacher-and by now i knew something weird was happening, but i had no clue what. when my teacher came back in, she looked really upset, so i knew something was wrong. Then i remember in the last period, the principal announced to the school that something bad had happened and to ask our parents about it once we were home-and to be careful on the way home. It was so confusing. There were rumors among students about what had happened, but i really had no clue. I got home and called my mom and asked her what happened. she told me planes hit the world trade centers, terrorists were involved, etc. i had no clue what these words meant or what had really happened. i didn’t fully understand until i saw it on tv, or the next day in school, when we discussed it. I was mostly upset because i had soccer try outs that day which my parents wouldn’t let me go to-they said they were probably cancelled anyway, but i was still mad. i really wanted to go to those..clearly the gravity of the situation didn’t sink in until later and i felt really awful. i ended up writing a poem about it.
It’s so true that we don’t appreciate what we have until its gone. i try my best not to take anyone or anything for granted-and to appreciate everyone for who they are instead of expecting them to be perfect. I think if people could just accept eachother’s differences and realize how much we as humans have in common, none of this awful stuff would happen. Hatred can do terrible things and i think everyone needs to take time to put things in perspective before they go about hating someone.
I was only five when 9/11 happened– I was in my own little world and probably didn’t really get what really happened. Of course we lived on the west side of Washington state– opposite side of the US! Such a lovely post, too, Katie.
This is beautiful. We should live our life to it’s fullest since it’s the one we got.
When I heard about the 9/11 attacks, it was my senior year of high school. I recall the principal coming over the loudspeakers telling our teachers to turn on the t.v.’s in our classrooms. It was scary. Those poor people and families. It breaks my heart.